RWFrog's Blog

In life and basketball, success can often be defined as capitalizing on opportunities and limiting mistakes. In tonight's NCAA championship game between #1 Kansas and #1 Memphis, this theme played out in a very thrilling and agonizing way for the respective clubs. 

All season long, Memphis has been chided for its lack of quality free throw shooting.  Throughout the tournament,however, they had been shockingly good. That all came crashing down tonight with an unbelievable choke job at the charity stripe by the Tigers.

As this game winded down, it seemed as if "He-Man" Derrick Rose had willed Memphis to victory, scoring 14 out of 16 points in a crucial stretch to put his club up by nine,60-51, with 2:12 left.

However, Kansas was able to get a few timely buckets and resorted to fouling its opponent, hoping the free-throw gremlins would rear their ugly heads against a seemingly unbeatable Tigers team. Their strategy paid off, as Memphis guards' Rose and Douglas-Roberts missed 4 out of 5 freebies in the last 1:15 seconds of the game, leaving a sliver of hope for the Jay Hawks.

When Mario Chalmers hit a downtown three fading to his left to tie the game at 63 and send it into overtime, Kansas cut out the Tigers' hearts. "Baby Ben Wallace" Joey Dorsey fouled out in regulation and the Tigers couldn't match the intensity of Kansas in overtime, falling 75-68.

When a team as good as Memphis loses a game like this, you have to realize just how mental sports can be. They knew Kansas was fouling them, praying for misses, So naturally their attitude was to not miss.

They missed, alright...free throws and a chance to be remembered as one of the greatest college teams of all-time.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/recap?gameId=28400006
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