Yahoo Sports’ Jason Fitz and former Big 12 player of the year Marcus Morris Sr. react to the Gators erasing a 12-point second-half deficit to beat the Cougars 65-63 and claim the school’s first title since 2007.
Video Transcript
Just a few days ago, the story of Houston was their massive comeback against Duke.
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Now we have a national champion as Florida gets a comeback of their own in an improbable 65 to 63 championship win.
Marcus, incredible poise by the Gators.
Man, the poise of the Gators have been shown throughout the tournament throughout the SEC has been amazing.
Their best player didn’t score until the single digit in the second half and Still was able to stay in this game.
It’s just amazed at how poised, how the team stay together and how they pulled out.
Well, I mean think about this.
Florida trailed by 8 in the Elite Eight, the Final Four, and the championship game.
In fact, nobody in the last 20 years has ever had that happen and win.
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That speaks to something in the wiring of the way they’re built, right?
Definitely, man.
The depth.
I talked about that the whole time.
The depth of their team was what’s going to get them to win, right?
To be able to come back each game when it looked like they didn’t have a chance, it speaks to the depth, it speaks to the togetherness, it speaks to the coaching right to the team just having that edge of knowing that they still had a chance to win the game.
Coaching key in the second half also because let’s be honest, the officials in the first half were letting them bang in the second half.
They were not.
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It was a massive adjustment and it.
The teams a minute to get used to that from a player’s standpoint.
How do you adjust to that difference, man?
Early they call like 10 fouls in the 1st 4 minutes into the second half, and I was like, man, they’re really trying to get a hold of this game.
But at the same time there were two veteran teams.
I seen it when it was during the halftime and I said I mean during the second half when I said, hey, they huddled up and they talked about it, right?
and.
Coaches probably address it in a timeout and both teams try to keep each other off the free throw line, but man, the breaths definitely took a hold of this game in the second half.
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You mentioned Clayton didn’t have a single point in the first half, but he ends up being the most outstanding player and down the stretch he had to be a big part of it, a huge night for him even though in some ways it wasn’t.
I have to give him credit, right, because even though he didn’t have a good shooting night.
He continued to play poise.
He continued to trust his team, and when the shots was available, he took them.
That shows you how together this team is.
You have some guys that don’t shoot well and they try to make their stamp on the team, right?
He continued to trust, he continued to move the ball and down the stretch each time he made a big shot.
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Look, Florida only.
Had the lead for about 61 seconds of this entire game, and that was enough to crown them champions.
We’ve seen remarkable games in college basketball.
I don’t remember ever seeing a weekend as remarkable as what we just saw.
Congratulations to the Florida Gators.
