Heartbreak in San Antonio: Duke’s Final Four Collapse
SAN ANTONIO — The atmosphere inside the Duke locker room was one of stunned silence, a quiet so profound that the sound of a door slamming shut echoed like a siren in the night. Each time a player or staff member entered the adjacent coaches’ locker room, the door’s bang reverberated, a stark reminder of the emotional spiral the team was experiencing.
It’s hard to prepare for the emotional turmoil that follows squandering a six-point lead in the final 35 seconds of a game. Yet, that’s exactly what happened when Houston scored the game’s final nine points in just 33 seconds, stunning Duke with a 70-67 victory on Saturday night in the Final Four. The Blue Devils were left in a hush, trying to process the unexpected turn of events.
Players moved quietly, grabbing slices of pizza from the 10 boxes stacked high on a Powerade cooler. They avoided eye contact with the lingering media, their eyes glued to their phones. One walk-on returned from the shower with tears in his eyes, while another wrote in a journal with a pencil, perhaps trying to make sense of the chaos.
They replayed the sequence of events that led to their downfall, wondering how a six-point lead could vanish in less than 20 seconds. Despite a series of inbounds failures, missed shots, and mental errors, two key moments in the final 20 seconds from star freshman Cooper Flagg — a foul and a missed shot — capped the stunning meltdown.
Flagg’s missed 12-foot jumper, with Duke trailing by one point, will be the play that lives on in replays. Duke had a chance to regain control and stop the bleeding; a timeout was called with 17 seconds left. The Blue Devils cleared out for Flagg, who found himself in an isolation matchup with Houston’s sixth-year senior J’Wan Roberts. Flagg pulled up from inside the lane, fading away from the outstretched arms of the 6-foot-8 Roberts. The shot bounced off the front rim.
“It’s the play Coach drew up,” Flagg said. “Took it into the paint. Thought I got my feet set, rose up. Left it short, obviously. A shot I’m willing to live with in the scenario.”
There was no second-guessing the play or the look. It simply didn’t go in.
“Cooper is the best player in the country, and when you get the best player in the country in the spot he likes, it’s really as simple as that. We got exactly what we wanted,” Duke senior Sion James said. “Sometimes shots go down; sometimes they don’t. That one didn’t.”
More difficult to explain was Flagg’s over-the-back foul on Roberts when Duke’s Tyrese Proctor missed the front end of a one-and-one with 20 seconds remaining. Duke led 67-66 at the time, and Flagg was whistled for a foul on Roberts, who clearly had Flagg boxed out.
The validity of the call will be debated for years, but Flagg put himself and Duke in a vulnerable position by appearing to hold down Roberts’ left arm and getting whistled for it.
Roberts, a 63% free throw shooter, changed the game by making both ends of the one-and-one, pushing Houston to a 68-67 lead and setting the stage for Flagg’s final attempt.
For a program known for its grit and toughness, it’s fitting that Houston’s trip to the national title game featured a game-changing boxout. Kellen Sampson, the Houston assistant and son of Cougars coach Kelvin Sampson, summed up the moment with one of his father’s folksy basketball sayings.
“Discipline gets you beat more than great helps you win,” Kellen Sampson said. “I’ve probably heard it a hundred million times growing up. Look, the more disciplined you are, the more that you can find yourself doing little tiny things that’s going to win.”
“A big-time free throw blockout was exactly what was needed,” he added.
Regardless of any debate over the call, Flagg’s foul put Duke in a suddenly unthinkable position. The Blue Devils went from a six-point lead with 35 seconds left to trailing by one at the 19-second mark. The foul was the final swing: up one to down one.
The key for Houston came from leaving Roberts alone on Flagg, something it didn’t do early in the game. Flagg picked the Cougars apart with his passing, and they made an adjustment to let Roberts handle the matchup by himself.
“We said here at halftime we’re going to trust J’Wan,” Sampson said. “He’s doing a heck of a job in his one-on-ones against Cooper. We’re probably over-helping.
“You have the No. 1 defense in America for a reason. Trust him.”
Houston’s defenders were relentless all night, with the most jarring statistic in the box score being that of Duke center Khaman Maluach, who failed to grab a rebound in more than 21 minutes of play and ended the night with a plus-minus of -20.
Roberts’ final act was getting a tough contest on Flagg’s potential game-winner.
“I thought he did an awesome job of getting his hands up high enough that it wasn’t an easy look,” Sampson said of Roberts. “Some tough shots all night.”
Flagg finished the contest with 27 points, shooting 8-for-19 from the field. He got little help, as Duke had only one field goal over the game’s last 10:30.
He rode back to the Duke locker room in a golf cart at 11:54 p.m., staring into space with a towel wrapped around his neck. Flagg entered the cone of silence suddenly facing the end of a season and likely a college career.
Three minutes later, Duke coach Jon Scheyer rode past with his wife next to him and athletic director Nina King sitting in the back. After leading by as much as 14, Duke had just coughed up the fifth-biggest lead in Final Four history. The loss will echo, just like that slamming door, long into the offseason.
“I keep going back, we’re up six with under a minute to go,” Scheyer said.
“We just have to finish the deal.”
Originally Written by: Pete Thamel
