Bank. Good. The Tigers’ lead was eight.
Jodi Bouyack’s annual rationalization ritual had been triggered. Rose’s shot falls only for a destined team. Time had come for Bouyack to count the reasons she loves Kansas now that a loss seemed probable in Monday’s national championship.
Every season for nearly two decades had ended with a crushing defeat in the NCAA Tournament, but this one might be the worst. Two days earlier Kansas thumped top-ranked North Carolina and coach Roy Williams, and the Jayhawks looked strong Monday night, leading Memphis by five at halftime. The stars were aligned.
But the lead was gone, Memphis was throwing in prayers and Bouyack’s eyes started to get puffy.
“What do we have to do?” she pleaded rhetorically to her husband, Scott, during the television timeout with 3:49 remaining.
They come from different places, Kansas and Memphis.
The Jayhawks represent a largely rural, mostly white state. The Tigers are the pride of a mostly black city.
But their hunger was the same. Kansas, as Bouyack and the faithful know, wins games and conference championships in bunches and is often a national championship contender.
Except the Jayhawks had not won a crown in two decades.
Memphis’ history of sports disappointments dates back to its failed attempts to land an NFL franchise and its unsuccessful NBA team. Even the Tigers’ last Final Four team, in 1985, was dubbed “Team Tragedy” by the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Two players from that team have died, another has been in and out of jail, and its coach, Dana Kirk, spent four months in prison and never coached after 1986. Because of probation, that team’s NCAA Tournament run doesn’t officially exist in the NCAA record books.
But these Tigers were different.
“I’ve been living in Memphis my whole life, and I’ve never seen the whole town get behind anything like this,” said Jeff Patrick, a pastor at Memphis Union Mission. “It was nuts.”
When Rose banked in his three, the 130 homeless men gathered to watch the game in the Union Mission’s great room — the same room where 80 of them slept on mats that night — erupted.
“The whole room went, ‘Whoosh!’ ” Patrick said.
Two minutes later, when the Memphis lead went to nine, the dancing started.
“It was the funniest thing you’ve ever seen,” Patrick said. “Everybody was celebrating, and these are men showing all this emotion with no alcohol. That’s not allowed here.”
•••
During the 3:49 television timeout, alternate official Pat Driscoll summoned referees Ed Hightower and Ed Corbett to the sideline. He wanted them to watch a replay of Rose’s shot to make sure it was a three-pointer.
After watching the shot several times, the game officials turned to return to their positions on the floor.
“Are you sure?” Driscoll called out.
They looked again, and this time something caught their attention. When Rose lifted for the shot, his right foot was behind the three-point line, but his left foot was clearly planted inside the arc.
One point was removed from the Memphis tally, and the score stood 56-49. But would it matter? The Tigers were rolling.
Join the discussion
Share your observations and experiences about news. Lively, open debate is the goal, but please refrain from personal attacks or comments that are racist, vulgar or otherwise inappropriate. If you see an inappropriate comment, please click the "Report as violation" link to notify a KansasCity.com editor. Thanks for your feedback.