Revenge of the Cats

Not since Lando Calrissian destroyed the second Death Star have we witnessed a payback as sweet as the Arizona Wildcat victory over the evil Duke Blue Devil empire. In 2001 we cowered in shame as the Blue Devils led by Mike Dunleavy pummeled one of the great Wildcat teams in the championship game. Eleven years later we met again, at last. Duke was a 9.5 point favorite and no one in the sports pundiocracy was giving the Cats a chance to win, no one except Sir Charles Barkley. Barkley, an Arizona resident, had watched the Cats all year long and he knew, as I did, that they were perfectly designed to beat a slower Duke team. Unfortunately for Charles and myself, Kyle Singler and Kyrie Irving made the Cats look like chumps in the first half. The Cats should have been run out of the gym, by Singler and Irving's combined 28 points, but they weren't thanks to future lottery pick Derrick Williams.

On Thursday night, DWill continued to cement his legacy as one of the greatest players ever to put on an Arizona uniform. He carried the team through a first half that could have ended their season. His 25 points, including five enormous 3s, kept the Cats within striking distance and changed the way the Dukies approached the second half. This incredible performance comes after Williams closed out the Cats previous two tournament games. Name an Arizona forward that has been more impressive and more important to his team's success: Michael Wright? Ben Davis? Brian Williams? Anthony Cook? Andre Iguodala? Channing Frye? Jordan Hill? Ray Owes? Sean Rooks?Chris Mills? Richard Jefferson? The only one I can think of is Sean Elliot and his number is retired. Depending on how far DWill takes the Cats he is headed for Elliot, Kerr, Bibby territory.

The proof of his impact can be seen in the interview Coach K gave as he headed to the locker room. Leslie Visser asked the coach about Kyle Singler but all he could talk about was Derrick Williams. If you look closely at the video you can see tiny stars circling his head as he struggles to recover from his shell shock. The show that DWill put on in the first half made Coach K change his defense. Duke began to pack it in which opened up lanes for the rest of the Wildcats. If he had to do it over again I think Coach K would have let DWill go for 60 instead of allowing open threes like the one Jamelle Horne hit after Williams found him open off a double team.

Andy Staples noted that "When the teams went to the locker room, Duke led Arizona in every major statistical category: rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, and most importantly, points." But then something happened and the Cats got aggressive. Early in the second half the Cats poked away a ball and Kyle Singler chased it down and threw it out of bounds before DWill could complete a backboard shattering dunk. Singler cut his arm and DWill pointed it out to the ref. Singler went to the bench and the Cats exploded on a 19-2 run.

The Cats were intimidated in the first half because they were getting their shots blocked by the bigger Blue Devils. Solo was particularly timid after getting blocked a few times in a row. He apparently didn't realize that he could go around his defender everytime he wanted to, a fact that Miller undoubtedly pointed out to him at halftime. In the second half the Cats stopped being intimidated and decided to grab each block shot and put it back in. The best evidence of their new found determination was the massive block that Plumlee put on Horne that led to two confident free throws.

In the midst of the rout Momo Jones had his best game as a Wildcat. He drove the lane and dished and did not commit one turnover. He became the 5th highest trending topic on twitter (Sean Miller cracked the top 10). Twitter has become an increasingly important signifier for recruits and the effect was obvious from the reaction incoming Wildcat Nick Johnson was getting on his twitter feed.

Not only was the second half probably the best half of basketball in Wildcat history it was one of the best halves of basketball in tournament history. Dennis Dodd of CBSsports breaks it down, "The Wildcats shot 58 percent in the second half. It's hard to miss when you're having the best 3-point shooting game in team tournament history (nine of 15, 60 percent). It's a breeze when you're scoring the second-most points in a half (55) by the school in the NCAA tournament."

Even the inevitable barrage of makeup calls by the referees could not phase the Wildcats. There was a stretch of 5 straight calls where the refs demonstrated the ominous Duke bias but the Cats just kept pouring it on and eventually scored more points on a Duke tournament team than have been scored on them since 1998.

This morning Espn analysts kept saying that the Cats came out of nowhere... Clearly they don't watch Pac-10 basketball. Arizona earned its 30th win against Duke, they won the Pac-10 regular season and they were within a miraculous three pointer of winning the conference tournament, HOW IS THAT OUT OF NOWHERE? Not one analyst on Around the Horn took the Cats over the Blue Devils. Everyone was saying how Irving was going to kill us. The east coast bias is truly ridiculous.

It's happening again as the Cats are a 2.5 point underdog against the UConn Huskies. Lets hope UofA can bottle a little of what they had in that second half and continue their run to the final four.

Memorable Quotes:

"The better team won tonight," "Williams, he's just a superb player. He's as good as anybody we've played . . . or I should say, better than anybody we've played."
- Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski

"I could have went and got some cookies and milk and came back and shot the 3," "They kind of forgot about us. They kind of disrespected us by saying they were going to back off and focus on Derrick. That's when we came and started making our run. We have other guys who can score." - Kevin Parrom

“THEY COUNTED US OUT!” - Momo Jones, as the buzzer sounded

"We earned a lot of respect tonight," Williams said. Sometimes, a team has to manufacture disrespect. Not Arizona. The Wildcats could find disrespect Thursday on every sports channel, on every sportstalk station and on every sports Web site. "The whole world counted us out," Jones said. "Critics. Analysts. People on the streets. People in Vegas betting on the games." -Andy Staples, Sports Illustrated

Miller: "Are you going to play? Or are you not going to play?"

Horne: "Yes, coach. I will."

Miller: "Show me."

- Miller to Horne at Halftime

"Makes me feel great that if we win this game on Saturday we're going to be known as one of the best Arizona teams to play." -Derrick Williams

"I just hugged him because he's crying,"- Krzyzewski about Kyrie Irving

“One fan told me, ‘My shirt is getting small from the 1997 championship. I need another one,’” “That flipped the switch. I want to give everyone what they want.”-Derrick Williams

"Anyone who scores 25 points in one half on Duke, his name is Superman." - Kevin Parrom

"We took their best shot, and then we gave them ours." - Jamelle Horne