There are many familiar faces for the UNC Tar Heels hoping to exact some revenge Monday night after losing last year’s national championship on a buzzer-beating three pointer.
That team lost its two best players in seniors Marcus Paige and Brice Johnson. But many of the same faces from last year’s squad are hoping to complete this journey with a national title.
UNC, the top seed in the NCAA Tournament’s South Region, will take on fellow number-one seed Gonzaga in Monday night’s championship matchup. A Gonzaga team that Tar Heel head coach Roy Williams evaluated as the best team in college basketball this season.
“I just have a great deal of both respect and fear,” Williams said at a press conference on Sunday. “Because I think they’re really good.”
Gonzaga – the poster child for high-level mid-major basketball over the last two decades – will be playing in its first national championship game Monday night. Gonzaga coach Mark Few, who calls Williams a mentor and a close friend, is leading a Bulldogs team that has lost just one time throughout the season and spent a good portion of the year atop the college basketball rankings.
“We’ve been a national entity for quite some time,” Few said on Sunday. “The product, the brand, the players, the team that we’re putting out there on the floor, we feel can compete with anybody in the country on any given night.”
One of the reasons for Gonzaga’s success has been its post players, where Few – like Williams – traditionally plays two big men in the paint, even as more schools are spreading the floor with smaller players.
“I think both these teams are probably facing for the first time depth that mirrors each other inside but also a willingness to just keep going and going in there,” Few said, “whether it’s off the pass or even off offensive rebounds to generate a lot of offense inside-out.”
Carolina enters the game after a one-point victory over Oregon in Saturday night’s national semifinal. Senior center Kennedy Meeks played what some have called the best game of his career against the Ducks, guiding UNC to a victory behind his 25 points and 14 rebounds.
But Williams said facing Gonzaga’s two seven-footers will be the toughest matchup the Tar Heel big men have faced all season.
“They have more size than anybody we’ve played all year long,” Williams said, adding that Florida State was “big, long” but didn’t have the depth of traditional post players Gonzaga boasts.
“Our big guys are going to be challenged a lot different way than they have been before.”
Williams added that when he looks at Gonzaga as a whole, he sees a lot of similarities to UNC.
“They believe in running. They believe in getting the ball inside. They change their defenses a little but not much; they’re mostly a man-to-man team.”
With Gonzaga’s ability to counter what has been a nearly season-long advantage for UNC in the post, the game may come down to the two ankles belonging to Joel Berry. The junior point guard has been battling sprains in both ankles over the course of the tournament. Berry said on Sunday that he had no stiffness and was feeling better but only time will tell how effective he can be.
The national championship game between the perennial mid-major power and one of college basketball’s blue-blood programs is set to tip off from University of Phoenix Stadium in Arizona at 9:20 Monday night.
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