The Southeastern Conference compiled the greatest regular-season record in college basketball history and set the NCAA Tournament mark by claiming 14 spots in the 68-team March Madness bracket, so it made perfect sense that an SEC team hoisted the national championship trophy Monday night in San Antonio.
The Florida Gators became that team thanks to one of the biggest rallies in NCAA title-game history, culminating in a 65-63 triumph over the Houston Cougars, who owned a 12-point lead with 16 minutes to play.
Will Richard led Florida (36-4) with 18 points, and Alex Condon added 12. Gators All-America guard Walter Clayton Jr. — named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player — scored all 11 of his points in the final 15 minutes while also delivering the game’s biggest defensive play with four seconds left.
The Gators led for just 64 seconds all night and never led by more than two points. They didn’t secure their first lead of the second half until Alijah Martin hit two free throws with 46.5 seconds to go. It wasn’t as if Florida owned the night.
Even so, the Gators claimed the school’s third national championship by capping a season that saw them beat then-No. 1-ranked teams Tennessee and Auburn in the regular season and claim six more Top 10 wins prior to the national title game against fellow No. 1 seed Houston.
Todd Golden, Florida’s 39-year-old coach who had to spit out a piece of confetti to answer Ernie Johnson’s questions on the postgame podium, could be pardoned for believing the Gators had earned an irrevocable mandate.
“We clearly have the best team in America,” Golden said. “And in three short years in Gainesville, we got the basketball program back where it belongs — which is raising trophies, playing in Final Fours and competing for national championships. I’m super fortunate to be with this group right here.”
Just like the last jubilant 30-something coach to win an NCAA title — North Carolina State’s 37-year-old Jim Valvano — Houston wound up on the heartbreaking end of the equation.
Unlike the 1983 NCAA championship game in Albuquerque, N.M., when Lorenzo Charles stuffed home Dereck Whittenburg’s airball just before the buzzer to pull off a shocking upset, these Cougars (35-5) were slight underdogs who weren’t hit by one improbable moment.
Instead, the 42-30 lead they worked so hard to build early in the second half was gradually whittled away. Houston scored just six points over the next nine minutes to help Florida pull even. Over the final 8:31, neither team led by more than three points.
“We did play well,” Cougars coach Kelvin Sampson said. “We just didn’t play very good the last three minutes. That had been a strength of ours all year long, winning close games.”
After Joseph Tugler canned a free throw with 2:05 left to give Houston a 63-62 edge, the Cougars’ last four possessions ended with turnovers. Prior to that, they had committed just five turnovers all night.
“At the end, you’ve got to get a shot,” Sampson said. “Got to do better than that.”
But credit a Florida defense that stepped up on each possession, including the final one when Houston’s Emanuel Sharp rose up from 23 feet with four seconds left in search of the game-winner.
Clayton jumped out with his arm upraised, making it impossible for Sharp to shoot. Sharp let the ball fall to the floor to avoid the travel in hopes a teammate might grab the ball and fling home a 30-footer.
Instead, Florida big man Alex Condon dove on the floor to collect the loose ball, and the Gators went wild all over the floor as time expired.
“It’s a crazy feeling,” Clayton said. “I honestly can’t explain it.”
One wondered if Duke took any solace in Florida doing to Houston what the Cougars had done to the Blue Devils just two nights before.
In the semifinals on Saturday, Duke led for 34:55 and held a 59-45 lead with 8:17 to play before Houston took its first second-half lead with 19.7 seconds to go.
On Monday, Houston led for 30:44 before following the same late-game path the Blue Devils walked in the semis.
With this trophy soon to go into the Gators’ trophy case, the pursuit for the 2025-26 title begins. Can Golden be like former Florida coach Billy Donovan — elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame over the weekend — and pull off back-to-back titles?
He will have to replace three senior guards — Clayton, Martin and Richard — who combined to average 46 points per game while each played more than 30 minutes per game.
“Obviously we have an incredibly talented group, one of the most talented groups individually in America,” Golden said. “I do think what separates us and has separated us all season long is our team talent, how our guys have played together and for each other all year. Because of that, we can call each other national champions for the rest of our lives.”
–Field Level Media
