ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Best ever?
Duke won't even be remembered as the best college basketball team this season.
No. 3 Connecticut stunned the top-ranked Blue Devils and the college basketball world last night, as coach Jim Calhoun's team knocked off seemingly invincible Duke, 77-74, in an epic NCAA tournament championship game. A crowd of 41,340 at Tropicana Field saw the Blue Devils blink and the Huskies' perimeter stars shine.
Connecticut got a magnificent game from its slashers, as All-America forward Richard Hamilton scored 27 points, off guard Ricky Moore had 13 in the first half and sophomore point guard Khalid El-Amin had 12, including a driving basket and two free throws in the final 65 seconds that were the difference on the scoreboard.
Moore made two huge stops on Trajan Langdon in the final 10 seconds and the Huskies ferociously collapsed on national Player of the Year Elton Brand, who didn't get off a shot in the last eight minutes, one reason Duke made a season-low 41.1 percent of its field-goal attempts.
"This was one of the greatest basketball games I've been involved with," Calhoun said after concluding his 27th season as a college coach. "As of this moment, we're the best team in the country. We have an incredible group of kids who thought this was possible, while folks around us, with me leading the parade, said otherwise."
An unblemished run through the Atlantic Coast Conference and 32 straight wins over the last four months had Duke (37-2) being compared to the strongest teams ever, but coach Mike Krzyzewski's star-studded collec tion of talent was unable to deliver his third title in the 1990s.
Instead, Connecticut (34-2) became the first Big East Conference school to win the title since Villanova beat Georgetown and Patrick Ewing in 1985. That game is considered one of the biggest upsets in championship game history, and it is a measure of Duke's mystique that a superb Huskies team was considered as big an underdog as Villanova was 14 years ago.
The nation's highest-scoring team, Duke had won its previous five games in the NCAA tournament by an average of 25.2 points, but Connecticut focused on Brand and took a chance that the other Blue Devils wouldn't beat them.
"They fought on every possession," Krzyzewski said of Connecticut. "He [Brand] got more touches in the second half, but it's obvious they wanted to take that away. It really should have opened up a little bit more for us. I don't know if we made as many good reads initially on that, but there were enough points out there to win."
Brand had 15 points and 13 rebounds, but Trajan Langdon led the Blue Devils with 25. The sharpshooter from Anchorage, Alaska, scored 12 straight points in one stretch to keep Duke in the game, and he made a big three with 1: 44 left to get within 73-72, but he got nothing out of the Blue Devils' last two possessions.
El-Amin drove past Brand on a switch and shot over Shane Battier for a 75-72 lead with 1: 05 left. After two free throws by William Avery, Brand blocked El-Amin, setting up the climactic sequence of the season.
Driving off a screen at the top of the key in an attempt to shake Moore, Langdon stopped his dribble and took one too many steps for the officials, who whistled traveling with 5.4 seconds left.
"I heard Coach K tell Trajan to get the ball," said Moore, whom Calhoun calls the best defender in the nation. "It was him against me, and I knew I was going to get a lot of help out there. I was going to stay low, stay solid."
After two free throws by El- Amin, Langdon took the inbounds pass and lost possession as he crossed midcourt, as he was hassled one last time by the kind of defense the Blue Devils didn't encounter in the ACC this season.
"There were two or three [Connecticut defenders]," Langdon said of the final play. "It seemed like 15."
Langdon's shooting -- including a rare four-point play with Moore draped all over him -- helped stake Duke to a 48-43 lead three minutes into the second half, but Connecticut put together a 12-4 run to go on top 55-52 and never trailed again.
The last of 14 ties, at 68, came on a pair of free throws by Langdon with 4: 07 left. As Connecticut blocked the entry passes to Brand and Duke kept settling for jump shots, the Huskies continued to attack the basket and deliver in the clutch.
Hamilton, the MVP of the Final Four, hit a pair of free throws with 3: 50 left to put the Huskies on top for good.
After a charging foul by Chris Carrawell, Hamilton hit a huge three-pointer from the left wing for a 73-68 lead with 3: 39 left.
Hamilton, who passed up the NBA last spring for another run at a national title, took his heroics in stride.
"It's been the same thing that's been going on all year," he said. "My teammates set screens. I got open opportunities and I took advantage of them."
The only Duke field goal of the last four minutes was the Langdon three that cut it to 73-72, and that came after Battier got an offensive rebound and kicked it back out. For all of Connecticut's offensive luster, it was its defensive work that shone the brightest.
Duke's place in history is no longer a pertinent question, but the game's quality made it material for a future slot on a classic sports channel. Besides the 14 ties, there were eight lead changes.
In the end, the celebrants were Connecticut and Calhoun, who made his first Final Four a joyous one.
"I'm no better or worse a coach than I was three weeks ago," Calhoun said. "I didn't have to do anything. All I had to do was be true to my kids and coach the best I could."
Connecticut's road to the title
Regular season 25-2
Big East tournament 3-0
NCAA tournament 6-0
Overall 34-2
NCAA tournament
Opponent (Seed) Result
West Regional
Tex.-San Antonio (16) W, 91-66
New Mexico (9) W, 78-56
Iowa (5) W, 78-68
Gonzaga (10) W, 67-62
Final Four
Ohio State (4 South) W, 64-58
Duke (1 East) W, 77-74
Pub Date: 3/30/99