Gonzaga vs. North Carolina. That’s your national championship matchup Monday night after the Tar Heels dispatched of the Oregon Ducks, 77-76, in the second national semifinal from Glendale, Ariz.
North Carolina vs. Oregon final score: Heels headed to the national championship game
UNC, the odds-on favorite to win the whole thing, gets a chance to prove it now.
For most of the proceedings, picture North Carolina like the big kid on the playground with Oregon trying like hell to get swings off, but the Tar Heels just held them at an arm’s length for most of the game, and led the entire second half. The Ducks threatened and did so valiantly in their first Final Four since 1939, but in the end it wasn’t enough.
A wild last two minutes almost cost the Tar Heels the game, including four missed free throws. But clutch offensive rebounds off of missed free throws saved the game.
UNC’s Kennedy Meeks played essentially the game of his life with 25 points (a career high) on 11-13 shooting from the field and 14 rebounds, seven of which were offensive.
“If it wasn’t for Kennedy Meeks we wouldn’t have been in the basketball game,” Carolina coach Roy Williams said to CBS after the game.
There is no getting around the fact that this is a landmark achievement for the Tar Heels to get back to the national championship game. We all remember what happened last year when Villanova vanquished the thought of overtime with a shot for the ages.
Usually teams don’t get back to championship games when they lose, but Carolina has climbed all the way back. It’s now blue-blood UNC vs. one of the ultimate Cinderellas in Gonzaga. We can’t wait.
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