SAN ANTONIO – You think you know heartbreak? Try being a Houston fan.
Imagine being on the wrong end of the most famous finish in men’s NCAA Tournament history, with Lorenzo Charles steering the ball in the basket and Jim Valvano running across the court; a forever moment of torture replayed every March from 1983 to eternity.
Imagine creating a run so unique and special in college basketball history, with Hall of Famers like Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler, only to be remembered for coming up empty at three straight Final Fours.
Imagine decades of irrelevance, only to return to the NCAA Tournament in 2018 – and lose on Jordan Poole’s improbable, off-balance, buzzer-beating three to send Michigan to the Sweet 16.
Imagine believing you’re on your way back to the Final Four last year, only to watch your best player, Jamal Shead, sprain his ankle.
These are the things that Houston fans have lived through, have suffered through, have internalized over so many years.
“We’ve had a lot of close calls that never went our way, a lot of close finishes that led to heartbreak,” Houston’s most-prominent fan and alum, CBS Sports announcer Jim Nantz, said late Saturday night in the middle of an Alamodome still buzzing with disbelief about what had just happened. “Tonight, we got one.”
A big one.
And if Houston wins the national championship on Monday night against Florida, maybe the one that makes up for all the rest.
Somehow, against all logic and evidence compiled over 37 minutes of a basketball game, the Cougars defeated Duke, 70-67, and authored arguably the greatest night in the history of their proud and historic program.
“I felt like if we could just hang in there, even when we were down 14,” Houston coach Kelvin Sampson said. “Just hang in there.”
They did, long enough for Duke’s offense to completely melt down. Long enough for game pressure to encroach on a young team that hadn’t played very many close games down the stretch of the season. Long enough for Houston’s players to believe that even some horrible mistakes and missed shots wouldn’t doom them, as long as there was still time on the clock.
And when it was over, after future No. 1 pick Cooper Flagg’s mid-range jumper came up short inside the final five seconds and Houston iced it at the free-throw line, pandemonium broke out in the Cougars’ section of the stadium.
Nantz hugged his kids and wiped away tears. Justine Ellison Sharp, the mother of Cougars guard Emanuel Sharp, jumped over the railing and a row of press tables to embrace her son. Some people were high-fiving and hugging; others were shaking.
And nobody could quite believe what they had just seen.
“Against that team?” said Nantz, who has been a constant presence at Houston games since stepping down last year as the voice of the Final Four. “Our guys are so resilient. Our guys have been like this all year. Everybody says, ‘you’re really good … but.’ But they don’t know how to quantify the size of the heart of that team.’
There are some games in every sport where you can see a comeback or a meltdown developing, almost before it happens. This wasn’t one of those times. From the opening tip and for the next couple of hours, Duke was better. Duke was in control. Duke was oh so close to running away with this thing. With 8:17 remaining, it was a 14-point game and Houston wasn’t doing much to suggest it still had a run up its sleeve. That’s supposed to be that.
“Never once did I feel like we could blow Houston out, even with the lead,” he said. “They were in the same position at Kansas (the Jayhawks blew a six-point lead with 20 seconds left and lost to Houston in January). I watched that game a few days ago. You never feel like they’re out of it.”
Sampson talks a lot about culture, which often comes across like one of those buzzwords coaches like to use without any tangible idea of what it means.
Well, on Saturday, we saw exactly what it means.
Houston kept guarding, kept rebounding, kept chipping away at a lead that bled from 14 to 10 to eight and then finally 59-55 with 5:03 remaining. Brand new game.
When Flagg hit a three with 3:03 remaining, to put Duke back up 64-55, it should have been over. But that shot masked the reality that Houston had completely thrown sand in the gears of Duke’s offense.
“It took us awhile to become who we are,” Sampson said. “But at some point if you have a culture … quitting isn’t part of the deal. We’re just going to play better.”
Did Duke help the Cougars out a little? Of course. As the game got closer and the pressure grew, the Blue Devils responded by trying to bleed clock. They seemed tentative, even afraid to shoot open shots they were letting fly earlier in the game. Duke made just two baskets over the final 13 minutes of the game, both from Flagg.
He could only do so much.
“Now there’s game pressure once it’s down to three,” Sampson said. “It’s a lot easier to finish the game when you’re up 20.”
The rest of it was a blur. Duke turned it over against pressure on an inbounds play. Tyrese Proctor, the Blue Devils’ typically steady point guard, missed the front end of a 1-and-1. Flagg committed an over-the-back foul going for an offensive rebound with 19 seconds left that put J’Wan Roberts at the foul line with a chance to finally give Houston the lead.
As Roberts, a career 59 percent foul shooter, calmly made them both, it was like decades of bad Houston karma on the big stage was coming back around in real time.
Finally.
“Whether it was losing to North Carolina State, I was there,” Nantz said. “Whether it was losing in the Cotton Bowl to Notre Dame (35-34 in 1979), I was there. The hard-core Houston fans know we’ve dealt with heartache a lot of times. Tonight …”
He paused.
“It soothes a lot of wounds.”