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The final Final Four notebook …
MINNEAPOLIS— You couldn’t blame Maryland’s players for not watching Monday night’s national championship game.
From where they stood, the Terps should have been there instead of the Blue Devils, who knocked off Arizona 82-72 to win the school’s third title. But to get to that point, Duke had to beat Maryland in the national semifinal — again.
And Duke did it again, for the third time in four tries.
“It’s a pretty tough loss to absorb. I’m just going to get away from basketball for a couple days and hopefully it will go away soon,”sophomore guard Drew Nicholas said. “It hurts a lot because the taste was there. It was on the tip of my tongue. I’m still kind of in awe of even saying the words ‘national championship game.’ We were right there, we had it, and it got away from us.”
Maryland led by 22 points early in the first half and by 11 at halftime of Saturday’s national semifinal. But just as in the first three games played between the Atlantic Coast Conference rivals this season, the squad that trailed at halftime came back to win. This time, Duke finished with a 95-84 victory.
Duke didn’t lead until Jason Williams’ 3-pointer made it 73-72 with 6:51 to play. Williams, of course, did in the Terps in this year’s first meeting, a 10-point comeback in the final minute.
Maryland got a measure of revenge by winning at Cameron Indoor in the final week of the regular season, but the Blue Devils won by two points in the ACC Tournament a week later.
“If you look at the games before today, we probably blew it in College Park,”Terps head coach Gary Williams said. “We won at Duke, the ACC Tournament game was a great basketball game that could have gone either way.
“(In the semifinal), we had it going early, they came back. Overall, it’s one of those things when you have a great team in your conference, you do the best you can against them.”
The Terps, who finished 25-11, still made it a memorable season. The Final Four was Williams’ first and the school’s first after 10 regional failures.
“We wanted to win the national championship bad, but at the same time, we still made history,”center Lonny Baxter said. “The previous teams, all the great players that have been through Maryland, knowing that we’re the only team that has made it this far — it’s a major step for the university. ”
Now the plan is to build on this year’s success. Terence Morris, a third -team All-ACC player this season, is the only graduating starter.
“It doesn’t feel good, but we know what we have to do now at Maryland to get here, which we didn’t know before,”Gary Williams said. “Once you’re there, you can at least say to the next team that all things are possible at Maryland.”
ARIZONA
The Wildcats were supposed to be in Monday’s national title game, but it wasn’t supposed to be so hard to get there.
The preseason No. 1 or No. 2 team in just about every poll learned that life is more than just basketball, contrary to the T-shirts claiming otherwise. Coach Lute Olson left the team in late December when his wife of 47 years, Bobbi, died on Jan. 1.
“All of us have things happen that we have to be willing to accept,”Olson said. “I don’t know how many people I’ve heard from that have lost life partners. Thank goodness for family and great friends.”
And thank goodness for basketball, which gave Olson something to focus on when he returned to the team in the middle of January. He helped his team bounce back from a slow start and ride a wave of momentum into the Final Four.
In Minneapolis, a billboard on the route from the airport to downtown read “Four Bobbi,”the same slogan worn by many of the Wildcat fans. Olson clearly was the sentimental favorite among the Metrodome crowd.
“I guess there’s a little part of me that’s sad that they didn’t win, because of the respect I have for what they’ve done,”Krzyzewski said. “If we would have lost, I would have been very happy for them.”
With all the players have been through this season, they were able to keep the loss of a basketball game in perspective.
“This year I learned so much about life and so much about how I need to be for the rest of my life,” junior Richard Jefferson said. “You see his family and how close-knit they are. That’s how you want to raise your family. When you’re a 19-, 20-year-old boy going into the world, you need an example like that.”
MICHIGAN STATE
The Spartans, despite their defending champion status, weren’t necessarily supposed to be back in the Final Four this season.
Mateen Cleaves and Morris Peterson graduated off that squad, but five seniors returned, three of them starters, to pick up the slack.
Andre Hutson, David Thomas, Charlie Bell, Mike Chappell and Brandon Smith took part in their third straight Final Four, falling 80-61 to Arizona in the national semifinal.
A journey that started four years ago with a Sweet 16 loss to Carolina stars Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison turned into quite an amazing journey.
“To spend four years at a university and really enjoy it, it’s great,”Bell said. “We’re graduating, getting our diplomas. When you’ve got five seniors that accomplished what we did on the court and off the court, it’s been great.”
Added Thomas: “It’s rare this day and age for a team to have five seniors who actually graduate.”
Spartans head coach Tom Izzo was asked what his secret was in keeping the seniors around.
“I beg them. I beg them to stay for my family and my program,”a laughing Izzo said.
In reality, though, it’s been players like Cleaves, who returned for his senior season with the sole purpose of winning a national title, that have done more than anything Izzo could.
“We’ve had some great role models telling the guys that it is better maybe to learn the game in college, get better so you’re not going somewhere and playing three, four minutes a game,”Izzo said. “I think if my guys are ready to go both emotionally and physically, I’m in favor of that. I still get disappointed with people leaving for the wrong reasons.”
And when they stay for the right reasons, it’s a pleasure to see.
“They’ve done it in the classroom, off the court and on the court, and they’ve done it for four years, which means they withstood the test of time,”Izzo said. “I couldn’t say in words how much I appreciate what they’ve done for our program. We’re going to miss them.”
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