INDIANAPOLIS -- Before Michigan took the floor to face Gonzaga in the title game of the Players Era Championship back in November, Elliot Cadeau made a comment to his teammates.
"We're the best team ever assembled," Cadeau said at the time.
Michigan proceeded to go out and beat Gonzaga by 40.
From that point on, the Wolverines were the most dominant team in the country -- and they ended Monday the same way they looked all the way back on Thanksgiving Eve: as the best team in college basketball.
Florida took down Houston 65-63 in a thriller, preventing the Cougars from getting a shot off in the closing seconds and denying Houston its first-ever title.
This is the Gators' third championship and their first since going back-to-back in 2006 and 2007.
Houston (35-5) led 42-30 early in the second half after holding a 31-28 lead coming out of the break. But as the Gators have done all tournament, Todd Golden's squad hung around, responding with a 12-3 run to cut the deficit to just 45-42.
The Gator's 12-point rally ties the third-largest comeback in national championship history. The largest came in 2022 when Kansas erased a 16-point deficit against North Carolina.
The teams were not separated by more than three points over the final 8:31 of game time. Florida took its first lead since 15:37 in the first half with 46 seconds remaining. In total, the Gators lead for only 64 seconds compared to Houston's 30:44 in front.
The teams were tied 12 times, but the championship only featured three lead changes.
After just four total fouls in the first 20 minutes, Houston tallied 16 in the second half and Florida had nine. Fifteen of the Gator's 37 second-half points came at the line, including their final five points.
Houston had five turnovers entering the final two minutes, but the Cougars coughed the ball up four times over the final 2:05 — a pivotal swing that turned the game in Florida's favor. Meanwhile, Florida turned it over nine times in the first half, but the Gators protected the rock in the second, only committing four all half.
Walter Clayton Jr. was awarded Most Outstanding Player after dropping 34 in the Final Four against Auburn and 11 points and seven assists against Houston. Will Richard provided a huge spark in the first half with 14 points, finishing with a team-high 18 points.
Houston's L.J. Cryer paced the game with 19 points on 6-18 shooting. He was the only Cougar in double digits.
Florida's two-point win is the smallest margin of victory in a men's title game since Duke held off Butler, 61-59, in 2010.
TAMPA, Fla. -- It has been a nine-year wait for UConn to get its 12th national championship. But in a lot of ways, it came at exactly the right time.
The No. 2-seeded Huskies finished their run through three No. 1 seeds, culminating in an 82-59 victory over South Carolina in the NCAA final on Sunday to claim a title that perhaps means a little more because of the journey the program and senior star Paige Bueckers has been on to get it.
After winning four championships in a row from 2013 to 2016 behind superstar Breanna Stewart, the Huskies hit a series of roadblocks with tough losses and injury heartbreaks.
But Sunday, the Huskies moved to the top of the women's basketball world again, sending Bueckers -- who is expected to be the WNBA's No. 1 draft pick on April 14 -- out with her first national championship.
A tearful Bueckers buried her face in coach Geno Auriemma's shoulder as they hugged on the sideline when she exited the game with just over a minute left, mission at last accomplished.
With guards Bueckers and Azzi Fudd, who missed most of last season with a knee injury, healthy at the same time, and the top freshman in the nation in forward Sarah Strong, UConn looked like so many of its championship teams of old. Not just the best team, but the team that also played the best.
Fudd and Strong both finished with 24 points, and Bueckers had 17. Freshman Joyce Edwards and sophomore Tessa Johnson led South Carolina with 10 points each as the Gamecocks fell short of repeating as national champions and finished 35-4.
UConn now has 12 wins in the Final Four by 20 or more points. All other teams in Division I women's history have 11 combined.
Bueckers was asked before Sunday's game how she would like to be remembered at UConn.
"As a great teammate, a great leader. I think those are the two most important things to me, just being somebody that people love to play with, make their teammates better, wears a UConn jersey with pride," she said.
Now, she also will be remembered as a national champion. Admittedly, there were points in her career where it didn't seem that would happen. UConn's disappointments go back, in fact, to the end of their 111-game winning streak at the Final Four in Dallas in 2017. The Huskies were defeated on a buzzer-beater in overtime in the national semifinals by Mississippi State.
Then in 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2024, the Huskies also lost in the national semifinals. They fell in the 2022 national championship game to South Carolina, and missed the 2023 Final Four -- the only time since an Elite Eight loss in 2007 that the Huskies have not made the season's final weekend. Bueckers missed the 2022-23 season with a knee injury.
With Fudd out last season, the Huskies went down to the wire with Iowa in the national semifinals, but lost 71-69. That set up a lot of pressure on Bueckers and the Huskies to make their dreams come true this year.
UConn wasn't perfect this season, as has been the case with six former UConn championship teams. But after an 80-76 loss at Tennessee on Feb. 6, the Huskies didn't lose another game. They won the Big East regular-season and tournament titles, then dominated their way through the NCAA tournament (including wins over 1-seeds USC, UCLA and South Carolina) to finish 37-3.
Sunday, the Huskies took a 19-14 lead after a first quarter that featured a very fast pace and some intense defense inside from UConn. The Huskies set the tone by shooting 52.9% from the field in the opening period, while holding the Gamecocks to 40%. Unlike UCLA in its semifinal loss to UConn, South Carolina was working the ball into the spots it wanted, but didn't finish well.
Strong's emphatic block of a Raven Johnson layup attempt at the 9:04 mark of the second quarter sent a message, as did her play throughout her first postseason.
Strong set a record for points by a freshman in a single NCAA tournament with 114, passing Tennessee's Tamika Catchings, who had 111 in 1998. That year, incidentally, Strong's mother, Allison Feaster, led Harvard as a No. 16 seed past No. 1 Stanford in the NCAA tournament. Feaster went on to a 10-season career in the WNBA, where her daughter will be headed in a few years.
Strong is also the first player (regardless of class) to have at least 100 points, 25 assists and 10 blocks in a single NCAA tournament since blocks became an official stat in 1988.
South Carolina coach Dawn Staley predicted on Saturday that over the next few years, Strong might end up as the best Huskies player of all. Which is saying a ton considering UConn boasts former players such as Stewart, Diana Taurasi, Swin Cash and two of the most recent Naismith Hall of Fame inductees, Maya Moore and Sue Bird, who were honored at Sunday's game.
UConn, which entered Sunday averaging 8.7 3-pointers per game, had just one in the first half, but that one shot -- by Ashlynn Shade from the left corner with nine seconds left -- gave the Huskies some momentum going into halftime up 36-26.
The Huskies continued to control the game throughout the second half. UConn is now 91-2 when leading by double digits at halftime in the NCAA tournament. The two losses were the 2001 national semifinal (up 12 at the half), when it lost to eventual champion Notre Dame, and in the 1989 first round (up 10) against La Salle.
Auriemma was coaching in his first NCAA tournament in 1989, in his fourth season at UConn. The Huskies have now appeared in 36 NCAA tournaments and 24 Final Fours. Auriemma, who turned 71 in March, is the first coach to win a championship at age 70 or older in Division I women's or men's basketball.
He joked before the game that he thought about quitting multiple times during the season the past few years, but then would go to practice and always be drawn back in.
"I think there's a lot of people counting on me to keep doing what I'm doing at UConn -- all my team, all my staff," Auriemma said. "I think they're counting on me to keep going and keep impacting and keep doing what we do."
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HOUSTON — A tournament run full of dominance ends with another UConn national title in Texas.
UConn held off a small second-half push from San Diego State to win championship No. 5, this time a 76-59 win Monday night in Houston. It's not only the Huskies' fifth title since 1999, it's their second in Houston and fourth in Texas.
The Huskies' most recent title was a six-game coronation with double-digit victories, as the Huskies (31-8) won by an average of 20 points. In the latest win, Tristen Newton (19 points), tournament MOP Adama Sanogo (17) and Jordan Hawkins (16) led the way offensively against San Diego State, while UConn frustrated the Aztecs around the rim for much of the night.
San Diego State (32-7) shot just 32.2 percent and trailed by as many 16, but it had climbed tall mountains before. In their last three games, the Aztecs trailed No. 1 overall Alabama by 9, Creighton by 8 and FAU by 14 in the semifinals — and won them all. Though UConn ended up being too tall a challenge, the Aztecs were the only team to mount a late threat, cutting the deficit to 60-55 and 5:19 to work with.
Then Hawkins shut the door immediately with a clutch 3-pointer. San Diego State never got closer.
The win makes UConn only the second No. 4 seed to win it all, joining 1997 Arizona. It also halted what would have been a series of firsts with San Diego State. In their first Final Four appearance, the Aztecs fell one game shy of winning their first title, of becoming the first Mountain West team to win it all and being the first No. 5 seed to take home the crown.
Keshad Johnson, Lamont Butler — the buzzer-beating hero against FAU — and Darrion Trammell all finished within double figures, but the Aztecs slumped through an 11-minute stretch without a field goal in the first half and fell short of a huge rally in the second.
In the end, UConn won another championship and became one of only six programs to reach that mark.
Kansas pulled off the biggest comeback in men’s national championship game history to beat North Carolina, 72-69, and win the 2022 NCAA tournament.
The Jayhawks were down by 15 at halftime and trailed at 16 at one point in the first half. The 16-point deficit breaks a record held by Loyola Chicago after the Ramblers came back from a 15-point deficit to win the national title. And until Monday night, the biggest halftime deficit ever turned around in a national title game was 10 when Kentucky came back to beat Utah.
David McCormack's basket with 22 seconds left put the Jayhawks up by three after North Carolina's Armando Bacot turned his right ankle and had to limp off the court with less than a minute left. Bacot injured that ankle Saturday against Duke.
The Tar Heels couldn't get a good look on the possession after McCormack's basket before the ball went out of bounds with under five seconds to go. But Kansas' DaJuan Harris accidentally stepped out of bounds while receiving the ensuing inbound pass and gave North Carolina another shot to send the game to overtime with 4.3 seconds to go.
That shot to tie didn't hit the rim. Caleb Love was smothered on the inbounds pass while 3-point threat Brady Manek stumbled as the inbounds play unfolded. Love was forced to shoot an off-balance guarded three that didn't hit anything.
Kansas didn't take long to erase North Carolina's lead in the second half. The Jayhawks quickly got the deficit down to single digits within the first 2:30 of the half and had the game tied before the 10-minute mark as Christian Braun rebounded from a poor first half to score 10 points in the middle of the comeback.
A Remy Martin three put Kansas up 53-50 with 10:20 to go and then Jalen Wilson got an and-one to extend the lead to six just 12 seconds later.
North Carolina didn’t go away. The Tar Heels tied the game at 57-57 before a three by Martin put Kansas back in front. UNC got the game tied at 65-65 with less than four minutes to go before Martin hit another go-ahead three.
UNC then took a one-point lead with less than two minutes to go before McCormack put Kansas up for good.
The title is Kansas' second under coach Bill Self. The first came in 2008 in a game that also goes down in March Madness lore thanks to Mario Chalmers' three with two seconds left to send Kansas into overtime with Memphis.
That title established Self as one of the elite coaches in college basketball and he's now tied with Iona's Rick Pitino and Villanova's Jay Wright for the most national championships among active coaches as he and Kansas are in the midst of a drawn-out battle with the NCAA over alleged pay-for-play violations as part of the FBI's investigation into college basketball.
Perhaps that turmoil between Kansas and the NCAA helped lead NCAA president Mark Emmert to accidentally say the "Kansas City Jayhawks" had won the national title before Kansas received the trophy.
Self is now the only Kansas coach to win more than one national title in his time at the school and KU ties UConn for the sixth-most titles among college basketball programs.The championship comes in Kansas’ 16th Final Four and first Final Four appearance since 2018. KU hadn’t been back to the national championship game since 2012 when it lost to Kentucky.
Before the second half began it was impossible to rule out a Kansas comeback but it was, quite frankly, remarkable how quickly the game turned. And that comeback also happened despite Ochai Agbaji’s four missed free throws within a minute in that span.
Agbaji finished with 12 points on Monday night and was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player over McCormack despite the big man's season-high against Villanova on Saturday night and his clutch buckets late against North Carolina.
The Jayhawks looked like they had more energy than the Tar Heels after the break after playing incredibly poorly for the first 20 minutes. It also helped that Braun and Wilson started making their shots after they went a combined 2-of-14 in the first half. Wilson even missed four shots near the rim before halftime.
The Tar Heels led 40-25 at the half in a lead that was even more remarkable given what happened at the start. Kansas got off to a hot start much like it did against Villanova on Saturday night and was quickly up 7-0.
UNC outscored Kansas by 22 the rest of the way as the Jayhawks looked lost and had a hard time making shots anywhere on the floor. Kansas was just 10-of-33 from the field in the first 20 minutes and North Carolina, quite frankly, wasn’t much better. The Tar Heels were just 12-of-33 from the field but dominated Kansas on the boards. UNC had eight offensive rebounds in the first half and the continuation of possessions was a huge reason the Tar Heels took such a big lead.
Bacot grabbed 10 rebounds in the first half despite that ankle injury. He finished the game with 15 points and 15 rebounds before he limped off the floor.
Kansas led 11-5 after the hot start and never led again until it was 53-50 after North Carolina took a 20-18 lead with 8:46 to go in the first half. The Jayhawks tied the game at 22-22 but Brady Manek hit two threes to extend North Carolina’s lead to six and spark a 16-0 first-half run that lasted less than four minutes.
INDIANAPOLIS – Eighteen years ago, Scott Drew said he came to Baylor "for a chance to win a national championship."
Monday night, he did.
Led by 69 points from the backcourt quartet of Jared Butler, MaCio Teague, Davion Mitchell and Adam Flagler, the Baylor Bears put an end to top-ranked Gonzaga's undefeated season with a resounding 86-70 victory in the national championship at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Baylor (28-2), putting a bow around the best season in program history, jumped out to a 9-0 lead in the first three minutes and never trailed in handing the Bulldogs (31-1) their first loss in an otherwise perfect season.
Gonzaga, trying to become just the eighth undefeated national champion and first since Indiana went 32-0 in 1976, whittled a 19-point lead down to 10 by halftime, 47-37, and even got back within single digits in the first six minutes of the second half.
But, the Bears responded with a 9-2 run capped by a Flagler 3-pointer that pushed the lead back to 16.
Butler scored 12 of his 22 points in the second half and matched Gonzaga freshman Jalen Suggs for game-high scoring honors to earn Most Outstanding Player honors on a Final Four all-tournament team that included Mitchell, Suggs, the Bulldogs' Drew Timme and UCLA's Johnny Juzang.
Teague (19), Mitchell (15) and Flagler (13) also scored in double figures and Mark Vital chipped in with six points and 11 boards, helping the Bears dominate the rebounding battle, 38-22, and outscore Gonzaga, 16-5, in second-chance points.
Timme and first-team All-American Corey Kispert added 12 points apiece for the Bulldogs, who lost in the final for the second time in the last four tournaments.
Baylor is just the second men's basketball team from Texas to win a national championship, matching Texas Western's 1966 national title. This is also Baylor's fifth NCAA national championship across all sports and the first in a men's sport since tennis won the school's first in 2004.
