Kansas 81, Belmont 51

Things don’t always go as planned.  It’s a fact of life.  It’s a lot of what this blog has stood for from the beginning.  The Long Road is hardly ever straight and narrow.

But on this night, everything went according to plan.  The bigger, more athletic team won the game.  The school that spends $9.4 million on basketball beat the team that spends $1.3 million.

All is right in the college basketball world.

After the game, the media huddled in a little room and student workers hustled in with stacks of papers.  These are the “post-game notes”—neat little off-the-beaten-path factoids—and of course, the game “book” with all of the final statistics.

Almost instantly, every reporter on the scene had everything they needed to write a good story.  Papers started to rustle as everyone tries to find that glowing stat.  FG percentage: Belmont – 30.8 percent, Kansas – 56.1 percent.  Turnovers: Belmont – 23, Kansas – 15.  Fast break points: Belmont – 0, Kansas – 21.

But what the game book fails to tell you are things like this:

With less than 12 minutes to play, a 19-year-old kid from Huntsville, Alabama got shaken out of his sneakers by a 22-year-old preseason All-American with a National Championship ring.  Sherron Collins constructed a masterful crossover and pulled up for a slick jumper.

Several minutes later, Kerron Johnson drove the ball to the hoop, elevated, threw up a shot, and slammed down hard onto the floor.  The ball glanced off the backboard and dropped in smoothly.  A whistle blew.  And one.

To start the first half, Kansas easily poured in five baskets before Belmont had any.  Everything was going as planned.  But the Bruins fought back.

A Keaton Belcher dunk, and two long-balls helped the Bruins take a 15-14 lead.  Allen Fieldhouse—where the great Wilt Chamberlain once played—went silent.  This was not how it was supposed to go.  A feeling of unrest was palpable.

Still, the Jayhawks pulled it out—by 30.  The Bruins were put in their place.

But there was fight in Belmont.  The game book didn’t mention that after every Bruin bucket, the BU bench erupted with screams.  Sometimes, a player would stand up… “There you go, Keaton!” No matter whether it was a bucket to take the lead, or a score to cut into a 20+ point lead.

Tonight, everything happened as it should have.  On a 94-by-50 foot piece of hardwood, a young Belmont team failed to score more points than Kansas.  And unfortunately, heart doesn’t always make the ball go through the hoop.

All is right in the college basketball world—for now.

Pierce Greenberg is a junior journalism major. He originally published this story in The Long Road Home.