Former Northern Iowa player recounts shot that broke KU's heart in 2010 NCAA tourney
It wasn't the biggest upset in NCAA Tournament history. And it wasn't the biggest shot ever made in the Big Dance.
However, no one has taken a more gutsy shot than Northern Iowa's Ali Farokhmanesh in 2010. The Panthers were huge underdogs to top-seeded Kansas, but were holding a one-point lead with 40 seconds left when they broke the Jayhawks' press and Farokhmanesh got the ball outside the three-point line.
Unguarded, Farokhmanesh threw caution to the wind and shot. Miss, and KU might have had an opportunity to take the lead. Instead, he swished the shot and Northern Iowa ended up pulling the upset.
Farokhmanesh wrote about that shot for The Players' Tribune with an essay called, "My Opportunity."
Here is part of what he wrote, starting with facing the press while holding a 63-62 lead:
"(Jake Koch) then threw it up to Kwadzo Ahelegbe on a bounce pass, even though you never throw a bounce pass against a press. Tyshawn Taylor came really, really close to getting the steal, but he missed it. Kwadzo saw that I was ahead of him on the right side and threw it up ahead to me on the wing. Kansas’s Tyrel Reed was stuck in a 2-on-1 situation with me and Johnny Moran on the opposite wing. He came at me initially and then kind of stepped back.
"So now I was looking at a wide-open three-pointer in a situation where textbook wisdom might dictate that you slow the play down. But if I had done things the traditional way up until that point, there’s no chance I would be in that position — I probably wouldn’t even be playing Division I basketball. I’ve never really followed the textbook way of doing things.
"This was a shot I had taken at least 10,000 times in my life. Coach had hammered in us this idea of taking advantage of opportunities. I knew this shot was an opportunity that I wanted to take, because if it went in the game would essentially be over. So I went for it."
Northern Iowa won that game 69-67.
Farokhmanesh wrote about the reaction the team received on campus and being on the cover of Sports Illustrated. You can read the essay here.
This story was originally published March 15, 2018 at 9:16 AM with the headline "Former Northern Iowa player recounts shot that broke KU's heart in 2010 NCAA tourney."