Houston was viewed as the fourth team in this Final Four but, one game away from winning a title, it deserves more respect than that.
Houston’s shocking comeback against Duke on Saturday night will live in college basketball lore forever. It was the fifth-largest comeback in Final Four history — Houston trailed by 14 points with 8:17 to play — and the Cougars scored the game’s final nine points to escape with an all-time steal.
Even in this loaded Final Four, the second-ever to feature four No. 1 seeds, the Blue Devils were viewed as the juggernaut. Their efficiency margin was the second highest of the analytics era and, with Cooper Flagg having been named National Player of the Year earlier in the day, Duke was the giant among giants.
Houston, on the other hand, was an afterthought. Auburn and Florida were the second- and third-most popular national title picks, with the public and media alike considering them as more realistic national title contenders than Houston given the way both dominated the SEC, which was perhaps the best conference in the sport’s history.
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The feeling around San Antonio was that, if one team was just happy to be here, it was Houston.
The big lead that Duke built felt like a prophecy come true, not some unexpected turn of events. On the other hand, the Cougars’ massive comeback became one of the major surprises of this tournament — and perhaps any tournament.
‘Everyone has an opinion’
Then again, maybe it shouldn’t have been such a shock. In storming back to beat Duke, Houston showed all the grittiness, intensity and toughness that Kelvin Sampson has imbued into this program. It’s what makes this lovable underdog so tough to keep down.
“I mean, everyone has an opinion,” J’Wan Roberts told reporters following the win. “They can say what they want to say. When you put 40 minutes on the clock and you put Houston against whoever, they’re going to get our best shot. We don’t have to be mentioned in the greats, or this and that. We’ll take the underdog spot, and we’ll just do what we do.”
But as the Cougars sit 40 minutes away from winning the program’s first national championship, it’s somewhat comical to think of this team as an underdog.
This team was ranked fourth in the AP preseason Top 25, ahead of Duke (7), Auburn (11) and Florida (21). Houston won the Big 12 regular-season title by four games. It has only lost once in regulation, back in the season’s first week against Auburn. The Cougars have only lost once at all since November, a one-point overtime defeat to Texas Tech, and hold the nation’s longest win streak at 18 games.
Looking further back, the Cougars have made the second weekend in each of the last six tournaments (now the nation’s longest active streak after Houston ended Gonzaga’s streak at nine). They have also won at least a share of a conference title in six of the last seven seasons, the last two in the Big 12.
Houston doesn’t belong in the underdog role. This wasn’t David vs. Goliath. It was Godzilla vs. Kong.
Yet, even now, Houston still seems underrated heading into Monday’s title game against Florida.
Why so little love for Houston?
Florida is the favorite to win Monday night, and it’s easy to understand why. The Gators have been playing at an incredibly high level for three months, and Walter Clayton Jr. is in the midst of one of the great individual NCAA Tournament runs of all time.
If Houston wins, it will be considered another upset. If the team with the lowest odds in San Antonio to cut down the nets ends up doing so, Houston might go down as one of the most improbable champions in recent memory.
But why?
Is it because the Cougars have only been a power-conference school for two seasons? Or because they went 4-3 in the season’s first seven games? Because they don’t have a star like Flagg or Clayton? Could it simply be they don’t play an aesthetically pleasing brand of basketball?
“We have to depend on unscripted points a lot of nights,” Sampson explained. “Unscripted points for us are second-chance points. I think we had 19 second-chance points [against Duke].”
For Sampson, the ‘second-chance’ distinction doesn’t matter much. Points are points, after all.
“What’s the difference between that and running the most beautiful play in the world? Somebody comes off a screen, you go ‘Bravo, great play.’ That’s still two points. That’s us. We’re probably more of an ‘offensive rebound and put it in for two’ [team] than a ‘run the greatest play ever and have everybody go crazy because you executed something’ [team].”
Should Houston finish the job, it will cap one of the greatest seasons in college basketball history. The same would’ve applied to Duke’s season had they won it all, as well as for both Auburn and Florida.
Houston’s season should not be diminished simply because most people thought one of the other three should be hoisting the trophy.