Seriously, How Did UMBC Win That Game?
Seriously? With all the shock and upsets and craziness of the 2018 men’s NCAA tournament, there is no debate which one was the biggest, most surprising, and most impactful on college basketball going forward.
Now, nearly a week after that fateful game, there are still more questions than answers of how a team who suffered a 44 point loss to Albany in January and a home loss to Stony Brook a week before the end of the regular season defeated a 30 win ACC team whose only losses were to the rival Virginia Tech Hokies (who made the tournament) by 1 point and West Virginia who is playing Villanova in the Sweet 16 on Friday. A UMBC team that won the America East by 3 points defeated Virginia who beat North Carolina by 8 points in the ACC tournament final and suffered only one loss in the ACC all year. Prior to this year, UMBC had only been in the NCAA tournament one other time (2008) which resulted in a 66–47 loss to Georgetown. Virginia had been making their 5th consecutive tournament appearance this year and was a number one seed 3 of those 5 appearances. I could go on and on with numbers and facts showing why that game should’ve been over at halftime.
But it wasn’t. None of those numbers and facts mattered last Friday. The fact is this. A 16 seed listed as a 20 point underdog defeated the number one overall seed by 20 points. So as the title says, how did UMBC win that game?
Quite simply, UMBC outplayed Virginia in virtually every statistical category. UMBC shot 54.2% to Virginia’s 41.1%. UMBC shot 50% from 3 point range. Virginia shot 18.2%. UMBC out-rebounded Virginia 33–22. Virginia finished with just 5 assists as a team. Virginia won the turnover battle forcing 12 UMBC turnovers to Virginia’s 7 but that did not matter. Just about everything went UMBC’s way and just about everything did not go Virginia’s way.
Did De’Andre Hunter’s injury hurt Virginia? Probably. Did it hurt them enough to excuse that kind of performance? Absolutely not. It was a matter of one team executing at the highest level and the other not executing at remotely the level they set for themselves throughout the season. Even though UMBC lost to Kansas State, nothing can be taken away from them when it comes to what happened against what many saw as the best team in college basketball heading in to the tournament.
The bottom line is Virginia was embarrassed and will live with this loss forever. The players and coaches of UMBC will carry the legacy of this win forever. As shocking as this win is, it was bound to happen eventually that a 16 seed would beat a 1 seed. But that doesn’t change the fact that in my mind, this is the single greatest upset in collegiate sports.
