There isn’t a single card-carrying member of Big Blue Nation who hasn’t had the number nine at the forefront of their mind since before the start of the 2014-15 season. Sitting in the co-pilot seat directly next to that number: 40. Forty straight wins for Kentucky’s ninth national championship -- the dream and the goal.
Kentucky’s 9th national title dreams still alive thanks to 9 made shots against Notre Dame
On the brink of losing everything it had worked so hard for since the beginning of last summer, Kentucky needed to be nearly perfect in order to keep its run at an unblemished season alive on Saturday. So it was.
On Saturday night, with the sports world watching as both the dream and the goal began to dim for the first time this March, the number nine earned itself a new spot in every UK fan’s heart.
Notre Dame led Kentucky by four with 12:44 to play when Willie Cauley-Stein’s attempted tip-in rolled off the rim and into Zach Auguste’s waiting arms. It was the situation every team, especially one of the most offensively efficient squads in all of college basketball, dreams about before taking the court against John Calipari’s Goliath. The Fighting Irish knew they could keep scoring, they’d already proven they could hold their own in the glass, and they had put UK in a position where it was forced to win a game with what many had pointed to all year long as its potential Achilles heel: halfcourt offense.
Kentucky did not miss a shot again. Nine attempts, nine makes, each one of them equally paramount in a 68-66 Wildcat triumph.
As is the case with any NCAA Tournament classic (a title Saturday night's thriller took immediate ownership of), the game wasn't "about" just one thing. It wasn't just about Notre Dame giving a gargantuan effort in its first regional final appearance in 36 years. It wasn't just about one of the greatest all-time "what if" shots from Jerian Grant at the buzzer. It wasn't just about official Joe DeRosa getting the biggest block/charge call of the season correct with six seconds to play. And it wasn't just about Kentucky making every single play it had to down the stretch in order to become the first team in college basketball history to move to 38-0 -- but it was more about that than anything else.
Nine straight. Each one seemingly bigger than the last.
The fifth -- a Tyler Ulis three-pointer from the corner -- cut a six-point Notre Dame lead in half just moments after a deep Steve Vasturia trey had sent the Fighting Irish contingent inside the Quicken Loans Arena into a frenzy and convinced the rest of the world watching that, yeah, this might actually happen. For the first time all season, the stage on Saturday had seemed a little too big for Ulis. He'd played sparingly in the first half after committing a bad turnover, and finished the evening with just three points on a single made shot. No one will remember the struggles, but everyone will remember the shot.
The seventh -- an and-1 from Karl-Anthony Towns -- resulted in the fourth foul for Notre Dame's Zach Auguste, the Irish's lone inside force, but one which had gotten the better of the Wildcat frontcourt for extended periods. Towns was unstoppable down the stretch, establishing deep position to get himself in a place where the succeeding baby hook shot wound up looking little different than the ones he practices alone in the gym. He accounted for four of the nine straight Wildcat makes by himself, and his free throw here brought the Cats to within one for the first time in over four minutes.
The eighth -- a deep three from the right wing off the fingers of (who else?) Aaron Harrison -- gave UK its first lead since the 15:32 mark of the second half. If Vasturia's three a few minutes earlier had been the shot that made everyone believe that an upset was truly possible, this was the one that made them feel silly for doing so. Of course Notre Dame couldn't keep slugging, of course Kentucky was going to win, and of course it was going to be "the Harrison who always hits the big shot" who put them over the hump.
The ninth -- another Towns bucket around the rim -- tied the game at 66 and restored some order after a miracle shot moments before had made everyone go back to thinking that maybe this was just the underdog’s night. Notre Dame’s last possession had seemed doomed from the moment it started right up until Jerian Grant was forced to serve up a 28-foot prayer to beat the shot clock. Perhaps he used all the brownie points he’d built up with the basketball gods too soon, because while that one ripped through the net and made everyone believe again, his next three weren’t as fortunate. Notre Dame wouldn’t score again. Kentucky would.
Nine straight. Notre Dame missed three of its last five free throws, and it would have been better served going 2-for-1 on its penultimate possession, but anyone saying the Fighting Irish “choked” or that Kentucky “didn’t deserve to win” on Saturday night were simply too angered by the final score to speak rationally.
With everything it had spent the last eight months working for hanging in the balance, the Wildcats made every shot they took in the final 12 minutes and 16 seconds of Saturday’s game. They shot 75 percent in the second half. They blocked a Notre Dame three-point attempt and forced a shot clock violation (the only Irish turnover of the second half) to set up what proved to be the game-winning free throws on the other end of the court. They defended Grant’s final attempt at a knockout punch as well as it could have possibly been defended. If that’s not “earning” a victory, then the definition needs to be re-worked.
Nine straight -- and Notre Dame still was a shot away from sending 40-0 shirts across the Commonwealth back into their dresser drawers for the next seven months.
“Very cruel,” Fighting Irish coach Mike Brey said. “It ends so fast, man. We emptied the tank tonight, and that’s all I asked them to do before the game.”
Emptying the tank would have been more than enough to take care of most of the other 67 teams in this year's tournament, but not the biggest one. A regional runner-up trophy and the potential to be forever referenced as the team that gave the 2014-15 Kentucky Wildcats their biggest scare are your still-too-bitter-to-open parting gifts for your efforts in one of the more memorable NCAA Tournament games in recent memory.
Nine straight. Both the dream and the goal, both 40 and the other nine, are still alive because of each of them.
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