J’Wan Roberts (13) and Emanuel Sharp (21) celebrate as Houston caps off stunning comeback to down Duke and advance to national championship. (Photo by USA Today Sports Images)
Saturday night, his involvement came as a fan, with his alma mater, Houston, facing Duke with a spot opposite Florida in the national championship at stake. But as his beloved Cougars capped off a 25-8 run over the final 8:17 of regulation, scoring 15 of the game’s final 18 points and all of the last nine, the narrator of so many forever images over the years hit the mark again as he made the walk with his daughters and son to the Houston locker room.
“That was incredible,” he said in his mellifluous tone, tinged on this night with equal parts pride and disbelief.
Houston’s 70-67 takedown of Duke, the blueblood that was the perceived favorite to cut down the nets and leave the Alamodome with a sixth national championship, was indeed incredible for how it ended. For how it looked nearly impossible when the Blue Devils extended their lead to 14 points before the Cougars started the fifth-largest comeback in Final Four history. But to those within the flagship program of Texas’ largest city, it was not so much incredible as it was symbolic of what Kelvin Sampson has built in the 11 years since returning to the college game at the behest of his dying father.
Six months away from turning 70 this October, Sampson is not the dynamic young coach garnering headlines the way his counterpart Saturday—Duke’s Jon Scheyer—or his next opponent, Florida head coach Todd Golden, has. The veteran boss is a throwback in every sense of the word, from his humility and respect for a game he has spent nearly a half-century in to the relentless defense he has instilled as the backbone of an old-school culture that still wins on and off the floor.
Last season, Houston lost to Duke in the South Regional semifinals, in a rock fight that was notable for Jamal Shead’s sprained ankle, but also significant for the Cougars shooting just 9-for-17 at the free throw line. Sampson’s response to the letdown at the charity stripe in the offseason was a time-tested method of reinforcement and teaching.
“We had our kids make 150 free throws a week,” he said. “Even though we only lost four games all year, the free throw line impacted two of those.”
There was no bigger beneficiary of the additional practice than J’Wan Roberts. Roberts not only made the biggest improvement in foul shooting on the team from last season to this season, the redshirt senior ended up hitting what turned out to be the go-ahead free throws as Houston rose from the mat and proceeded to knock Duke out.
“I don’t think J’Wan missed a day from June 2 until we left on Wednesday,” Sampson said of Roberts’ participation in his free throw drill. “When he started this, he was at 66 (percent). On his own, he went from 66 to 86. That wasn’t the coaches. He went to that free throw line every single day and made himself. In the moment tonight, when everybody was watching, he prepared himself when nobody was watching. So God bless him.”
“Looking at the time, looking at the clock, I feel like we just believed in ourselves,” Roberts said. “Coach always tells us (to) just keep playing, fight, never quit. If you lose the game and you didn’t quit, you didn’t really lose. Going into games like this, you never want to go down, but it happens. But once you don’t quit and you believe, anything can happen.”
The never-say-die mentality is just another part of Sampson’s rough-hewn upbringing in the sport and how it reflects in his team. In his first press conference upon arriving in San Antonio, the coach recalled his beginnings in the game as a graduate assistant for Jud Heathcote at Michigan State, when he and a then-twentysomething up-and-comer named Tom Izzo sectioned off part of the parking lot behind the old Jenison Field House to form a makeshift court. The necessity to find a way has followed him in all the twists and turns since, and even after a first half Saturday that he would probably love to forget, he knew how to fix it.
“Instead of ranting and raving at halftime, I was probably more calm and positive,” Sampson recalled. “I thought that’s what they needed. They know they played poorly, but we were only down six. It took us a while to become who we are. At some points, if you have a culture, quitting is not part of the deal. We’re not going to quit, we’re just going to play better.”
And play better, the Cougars did. After Cooper Flagg—the national player of the year—put Duke up by 13 with 10:31 to play, the Blue Devils attempted just nine field goals for the remainder of the game. Houston conceded just one make among those nine shots.
The Cougars came into the weekend as somewhat of an afterthought between Duke having the nation’s most efficient offense, Auburn being the champion of a historically dominant SEC, and Florida emerging as perhaps the most complete team of the final quartet. Yet here Houston stands, unbroken and unwilling to deviate from a style and culture that honors the game, and still yields dividends even when new methods of payment are more en vogue.
“Everyone has an opinion,” Roberts said of the perceived slights toward his team. “They can say what they want to say. When you put 40 minutes on the clock and you put Houston against whoever, they’re gonna get our best shot.”
“We don’t have to be mentioned in the greats or this and that. We’ll take the underdog spot and we’ll just do what we do.”
And what they do, on this night especially, is truly incredible.
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