After half a century, Virginia's one shining moment

And in the end ...

When I sat down to fill out a bracket before this year's NCAA tournament, I did it with my heart rather than my head.

The fact is, despite a good long run covering college basketball in the '80s and '90s, including two seasons as a voter in the Associated Press poll, I've never been good at predicting.

I didn't do that well this year either. I picked Nevada, a team I covered for two seasons 20 years ago, to win the Midwest Region and reach the Final Four.

Nevada lost in the first round.

I missed on Texas Tech, predicting a Sweet Sixteen loss to ... wait for it ... Nevada.

My bracket

I did pretty well on the top half of the card. I had Duke and Michigan State in the East Region and I even had Sparty winning and moving on to the Final Four.

I had the South Region too. Virginia and Purdue in the final and Virginia emerging.

That's where my heart came into play. I have followed Virginia basketball faithfully for more than half a century.

After last season's shocking first-round loss to UMBC when the Wahoos were the top-seeded team in the field of 68, I figured redemption would come this year.

So I picked the 'Hoos to go all the way and win their first-ever NCAA title.

And they did.


They won the tournament for the first time ever, and they did it in a way that may never happen again. In each of its last three games, Virginia trailed with 20 seconds to go.

Against Purdue, Mamadi Diakite made a 15-footer at the buzzer to send the game into overtime.

Coach Bennett cuts down the net in Minneapolis.

Against Auburn, with Virginia down two points with 1 second remaining, Kyle Guy was fouled shooting a three-pointer and made all three foul shots for a 63-62 victory.

And in the title game against Texas Tech, DeAndre Hunter made a three-pointer in the last 15 seconds to force overtime.

And Virginia won.

Five years ago, Virginia had never won a national championship in any of the Big Three sports -- football,. basketball and baseball.

Then in 2015, the baseball team beat Vanderbilt to win the College World Series.

And now this. I don't know if there has been anything in my life not involving people I love that has made me any happier than this. It doesn't completely make up for Donald Trump, but it helps.

Now if they can only repeat.