10 YEARS AGO: Wildcats Defeat Three Giants En Route to Berth in Elite Eight
3/28/2018 11:22:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Written By: John Kilgo
 |
1st Round - March, 21, 2008 RBC Center | Raleigh, N.C. (19,477) #10 Davidson - 82 | #7 Gonzaga - 76 Game Story Box Score Watch |
 |
2nd Round - March, 23, 2008 RBC Center | Raleigh, N.C. (19,477) #10 Davidson - 74 | #2 Georgetown - 70 Game Story Box Score Highlights |
 |
Sweet 16 - March, 28, 2008 Ford Field | Detroit, Michigan (57,028) #10 Davidson - 73 | #3 Wisconsin - 56 Game Story Box Score Watch |
 |
Elite Eight - March, 30, 2008 Ford Field | Detroit, Michigan (57,563) #1 Kansas - 59 | #10 Davidson - 57 Game Story Box Score Watch |
Jason Richards, Davidson's outstanding senior point guard for 2007-08, was emphatic when he talked about team goals before the start of a rugged non-conference schedule.
"We want to go back to the NCAA tournament," he said, "but going back to play just one game would be a disappointing end to my Davidson career. We've been to the tournament two years in a row. We've experienced that. Now we want to return and win some games."
Coach Bob McKillop took steps to prepare his team for that dream by scheduling outside opponents that included North Carolina, Duke, UCLA and NC State. Davidson wanted to test itself against the best, knowing that playing those teams would expose any weaknesses and give them a chance to correct them before tournament time.
It's not a strategy that's recommended if the goal is merely to impress outsiders by the number of wins and losses. But if the goal is to get better – and that was Davidson's mission from Day One – then the challenging schedule made sense.
After cruising past Division III opponent Emory 102-56, the Wildcats went to downtown Charlotte and Bobcats Arena to take on No. 1 North Carolina. A full house showed up for the game — 19,299 — fairly equally split between those wearing Davidson red and black and Carolina blue. The atmosphere of the game was electric: great crowd, intense competition and close game that raged back and forth. Davidson's last lead came with 6:40 to play when Stephen Curry hit a 3-point basket to put the 'Cats up 57-56. The Tar Heels found themselves hanging on to win 72-68.
While the loss was disappointing, the Wildcats showed they could compete against the nation's best. It was a valuable lesson that would come in handy in March.
The next six games served as a roller-coaster ride for the Wildcats. Davidson traveled to Kalamazoo, Mich., and lost to Western Michigan 83-76 while allowing the home team to shoot 59.1 percent from the field.
Practice the next day – on Thanksgiving morning – was intense. If the Wildcats were going to be special, performances like that one couldn't occur. Lessons had to be learned.
Davidson routed North Carolina Central, won by 11 in its conference opener at Appalachian State with Curry scoring 38, and then lost back-to-back games against Duke and Charlotte. Davidson was competitive against Duke, losing by six, but not very good in a seven-point loss to Charlotte.
The Wildcats went to California on Dec. 8 to play mighty UCLA. Davidson led by 17 – 32-15 – with 7:48 left in the first half. The crowd in Anaheim was stunned. But, the Bruins fought back to cut the deficit to four at halftime en route to a 75-63 win. Another scrappy effort against a powerhouse team – but also another loss.
After beating Citadel by 21, Davidson traveled to the RBC Center in Raleigh to take on NC State. Curry hit a 3-pointer with 43 seconds to play to give Davidson a 65-64 lead. NCSU's Ben McCauley shot and missed, but his teammate Gavin Grant came down with the rebound and was fouled with three seconds to play.
Grant made two free throws, and Davidson missed at the buzzer to take a one-point loss and a 4-6 record with them into the Christmas holidays. It was a keen disappointment, coming so close and yet losing to another widely known team.
But playing in the RBC Center would eventually help Davidson. Stay tuned for that development.
Davidson began a run of 16 consecutive Southern Conference games on Jan. 3 with a smashing 92-67 win over Georgia Southern. The Wildcats won all 16 of those games, most of them by wide margins. The exception was a 59-57 win at Elon in a game that it appeared the Wildcats would lose.
Davidson rode the winning streak into the ESPN BracketBusters game at Winthrop. Davidson won that one by 13 and returned to conference play where it ended regular-season play with a home win over Appalachian State and a 20-point road win on Senior Night at Georgia Southern.
The Wildcats took a 19-game winning streak into the Southern Conference tournament in Charleston where they had to prove themselves all over again to be sure of a bid to the NCAA tournament.
They proved themselves, all right. They beat Wofford 82-49, UNC Greensboro 82-52 and knocked out Elon in the championship game 65-49. Their NCAA tournament ticket was punched for the third consecutive year. But would this trip be different?
A crowd of students and friends of the college gathered in the Student Union late on a Sunday afternoon to hear the pairings for the tournament. Davidson was seeded 10th and would play 7th-seeded Gonzaga in Raleigh's RBC Center in the first round. A roar went up in the Davidson union when the Davidson road map was announced.
Davidson was a determined team heading into the tournament. They certainly caught a break by getting to play in Raleigh, but Gonzaga was the regular season West Coast Conference champions and brought a record of 25-7 to Raleigh. Playing on the road would not intimidate them. Meanwhile, the Wildcats had a 22-game winning streak and were feeling pretty good.
With a partisan crowd of 19,722 pulling for them in Raleigh, Davidson saw Gonzaga lead 28-17 with 8:17 to play in the first half and by 41-36 at halftime. The Zags continued to dominate seven minutes into the second half with a 58-48 advantage. But then the game began to turn Davidson's way. The closer the Wildcats came, the louder the crowd. A Curry 3-pointer tied the game at 62 with 9:46 to play.
The two teams swapped leads until Davidson got the ball with just over a minute to play. Max Paulhus Gosselin, who played a terrific game, missed a 3-point attempt, and as the ball headed towards the right corner of the court and appeared to be going out of bounds, Andrew Lovedale raced from the free throw line to the corner, grabbed the ball inches before it went out of bounds, turned and passed to Curry who hit a 3-pointer for a 77-74 Davidson lead. The Wildcats never trailed again and won 82-76. Curry had 40 points, 30 in the second half. Lovedale captured 13 rebounds, and Richards recorded nine assists.
It was Davidson's first NCAA tournament win since 1969 and set up a showdown with the second-seed from the Midwest Regional, Georgetown. The Hoyas were big, athletic, won the Big East regular season title, ranked No. 8 in the nation, No. 1 in the nation in field goal percentage defense and No. 5 in scoring defense.
As the two teams lined up facing each other on the court as the national anthem played, Georgetown's Patrick Ewing, 6-9, reached over and pounded the chest of 7-2 teammate Roy Hibbert and said something to him. The favored Hoyas were ready – but so was Davidson. The Wildcats had played UNC, Duke, UCLA. They weren't intimidated by Georgetown.
The Hoyas had quick athletes who could defend, and they made life miserable for Curry in the first half and led 38-27 at the break. Lefty Driesell, the former Davidson coach, appeared on the school's radio network at half and said, "Curry's going to have to get more shots in the second half, but this game isn't lost. Davidson can come back and win it."
It certainly didn't look that way early in the second half, as Georgetown roared to a 46-29 lead with 17:52 to play. Then the game turned, almost dramatically so. Down by 16, the Wildcats went on a 7-0 run. Then down by 11, the 'Cats scored nine in a row to make it a 50-48 game with 8:45 to play.
You could see it in the faces of Georgetown's players: they had a feisty opponent that was not going to be knocked out. Paulhus Gosselin tied the game at 57 with 5:06 to play, and once again, the RBC Center crowd roared its support of the underdog Wildcats. When Curry hit a tough layup and then the ensuing foul shot with 4:35 to play to give Davidson a 60-58 lead, their first in the game since the score was 11-9. Once down by 17 in the second half, McKillop's team suddenly led by two.
Davidson never trailed again and defeated the Hoyas 74-70 to earn a spot in the Sweet 16 and a trip to Detroit to play in massive Ford Field, home of the NFL Detroit Lions.
Next up: Big Ten regular-season and tournament champion Wisconsin, with 31 wins, the most in school history. The Badgers were giving up only 53.9 points a game, which led the nation in scoring defense. The Wildcats were riding a 24-game winning streak. Something would have to give. Someone would have to blink.
Davidson belonged on this stage and knew it. Please, don't call them Cinderella.
With more than 57,000 fans in attendance at Ford Field, including Cleveland Cavaliers great LeBron James who wanted to see Curry play in person, the Wildcats and Badgers traded punches in the first half and went to the locker rooms tied at 36.
Davidson owned the second half – lock, stock and barrel. Richards hit a 3-pointer with 12:13 to play to put Davidson up 57-45. Curry's layup with 9:07 left gave Davidson a 63-46 lead.
This was Davidson's game, pure and simple. The Wildcats were better than the Big Ten champions and no one who saw the game would dare dispute it. Curry continued his scoring rampage with 33 points. Lovedale had 12 points, and the poised Richards had 13 assists and no turnovers in a spectacular performance.
Final score: Davidson 73 Wisconsin 56. The Wildcats won the second half by a whopping 17 points to earn a spot in the Elite Eight against the Kansas Jayhawks, the tournament champions of the tough Big 12.
Kansas coach Bill Self had never taken a team to the Final Four, and a lot of fans and media people in his own state reminded him of it. Davidson was looking to go to the Final Four for the first time in school history. So much was at stake.
The game was as close as pages in a book. The biggest lead by either team in the first half was four points with seven ties. The Jayhawks sprinted off the court at halftime with a 30-28 lead, but this was anybody's game. It had the smell of a game that was going down to the last second.
Kansas took its biggest lead of the second half with 12:11 to play at 43-37. But then Bryant Barr came off Davidson's bench and thrilled most of the crowd of 57,563 by making three 3-point field goals in two minutes to give Davidson a 49-45 lead with 9:33 to play.
Kansas had talent and determination, too, and pushed to a 59-53 lead with 1:15 to play. Davidson's Thomas Sander, who was playing with a painful injury to the thumb on his shooting hand, made a free throw, and when he missed the second Davidson rebounded and Richards passed to Curry for a 3-pointer to make it 59-57 with 55 seconds to play.
Kansas ran some clock on its next possession but when Sherron Collins missed a 3-pointer, Davidson rebounded and took timeout with 17 seconds to play. Coach McKillop put the ball in the hands of Curry in the backcourt and when Curry got to the frontcourt, Kansas jumped him with a double team. With the clock winding down and no cracks open to get off a shot himself, Curry passed to Richards who took a long, contested shot that missed at the buzzer. Missed left, but just barely.
Kansas won 59-57 and went on to win the national championship.
The Wildcats covered themselves with glory, won the hearts of basketball fans from coast to coast, and finished the season with 29 wins and seven losses.
Richards got his preseason wish. A return to the NCAA tournament and some huge victories on the game's biggest stage. And all of those people who once had to ask where Davidson was located? After the tournament, they didn't need to ask anymore.
They knew the answer.
