ST. PETERSBURG – A day before the Connecticut Huskies stunned Duke, and less than an hour after their remarkable 77-74 win Monday night in the championship game of the NCAA Tournament, Jim Calhoun made two statements that will follow him and his program for years to come.
“We were criticized for mere excellence,” said Calhoun. “And I don’t know if you should be criticized for mere excellence but that’s probably the rules and I guess I’ll live by them. I don’t necessarily accept them all the time, but I can at least live by them.”
Beginning yesterday the Huskies have to live by another set of rules: the rules of a champion.
No longer will Calhoun and UConn often find themselves in the role of underdog, as they were Monday night in Tropicana Field against an alleged team of the decade that couldn’t even be the best team on this given night. As Mike Krzyzewski pointed out, this was no Duke fluke. Connecticut, which begrudgingly accepted the role of underdog, was quicker and better defensively than the vaunted Blue Devils.
But the perception was Duke was in a league of its own. The Huskies always have thrived under these conditions.
Last season they weren’t given any chance of beating North Carolina in Greensboro for the East Regional title. The Huskies, who buy into Calhoun’s Rodney Dangerfield attitude of no respect, gave the Tar Heels a battle before falling 75-64.
Earlier this season they weren’t given much of a chance of winning at Stanford without the injured Richard Hamilton, the MVP of the Final Four who scored 27 points against Duke. Connecticut won handily, 70-59. In the championship game of the Big East Conference Tournament in the Garden, a hot St. John’s team was supposed to whack UConn. Final score: UConn 82, St. John’s 63.
“I turned on the TV [Monday] morning and the first thing I heard was everybody saying Duke is a heavy favorite and Duke this and Duke that, and I didn’t hear anything about UConn,” said forward Kevin Freeman. “We wanted to shock the world today and I think we did.”
The Huskies did, but it will be a long time before they sneak up on anyone again. They are the defending national champions. The bull’s eye is on their backs. Gaudy facts, such as UConn being the seventh winningest program in the 90’s (257-74), will no longer be a secret.
When next season’s pre-season rankings come out, Connecticut will be among the Top 5, even without Ricky Moore, who has completed his eligibility and Hamilton, who will probably be playing in the NBA. Calhoun already has signed one of the nation’s top recruiting classes and big man Ajou Ajou Deng should be academically eligible.
The Huskies should again be tested in the Big East by St. John’s, which probably will lose Ron Artest to the NBA but will gain the services of power forward Anthony Glover, who sat out last season under Proposition 48. Temple, which loses only guard Rasheed Brokenborough from a team that lost to Duke 85-64 in East Regional finals, could get coach John Chaney to his first Final Four.
Michigan State, which also had its season ended by Duke, 68-62 in the national semifinals, should return six of its top nine players. The Spartans and Ohio State, which returns four of five starters from the team that lost 64-58 to UConn in the other national semifinal, should fight for Big Ten supremacy.
Cincinnati always has talent and depth but the Bearcats have become college basketball’s comet, beginning the season the like burning fire and tailing off into oblivion. If Bob Huggins can ever keep the Bearcats on an even keel they could make it to Indianapolis, site of next year’s Final Four.
UCLA should be the team to beat in the West and Florida is poised to rise in the South. Duke, with rising star Corey Maggette, will once again be the team to beat especially if center Elton Brand and point William Avery, both sophomores, decide to chase the national championship as juniors, rather than to cash NBA paychecks.
“I don’t know if losing [to UConn] will persuade them to return,” said Duke senior Trajan Langdon. “I hope they do. It would be a great team.”
It will. But UConn, not Duke will be the defending national champs. The Huskies will not be overlooked.
Oh yes, the other statement uttered by Calhoun, who devised a flawless game plan for Duke, was this: “I’m no better coach than I was three weeks ago and no worse than I was three weeks ago,” he said.
It’s an accurate assessment. But now Calhoun is a national championship coach and the Huskies are champions. The rules have changed.
