The 2022 Men’s and Women’s Division I NCAA Basketball Tournaments have concluded. They were outstanding tournaments. I will break down both National Championships.
The #1 seeded South Carolina Gamecocks and the #2 seeded UConn Huskies faced off in the women’s national championship game. The Gamecocks won their 2nd title in school history, winning 64-49. Last year, they lost in the Final Four to the eventual champion, Stanford, but they got revenge for that. UConn coach Geno Auriemmam lost his 1st ever national championship after previously being 11-0, while South Carolina coach Dawn Staley won her 2nd championship; she is now 2-0 in championship games. Aliyah Boston had 11 points and 16 rebounds for the Gamecocks, and won the Final Four’s Most Outstanding Player. Boston said, “I feel like coming into this game, the conversation was about how Coach Auriemma was 11-0 in title games. But Coach Staley was 1-0, and now she’s 2-0. And I think it just shows the type of program that she’s built.”
In the Men’s game, it was the #8 seeded North Carolina Tar Heels against the #1 seeded Kansas Jayhawks. This was an outstanding game. The Tar Heels were winning 40-25 at halftime, but Kansas rallied back to make it 69-68 North Carolina with a minute left. David McCormack made a big bucket with 1:21 to put the Jayhawks in front by 1.Then a minute later, McCormack made another shot to make it 72-69 Jayhawks. Caleb Love took a 3-pointer to send the game to overtime, but he airballed it, and the Jayhawks were national champions. This was the largest comeback in National Championship history. The previous record was the 1963 championship, when Loyola-Chicago came back down 15 against Cincinnati.
That’s it for March Madness. I loved these tournaments, and I hope you did too.
