UConn’s Final Four Push: Mullins’ Shot, Reed Jr.’s Heroics Beat Duke
All night, it had been all Duke. The No. 1 seed Blue Devils appeared poised to punch their ticket to their 19th ever and second straight Final Four. All that separated them from a trip to Indianapolis, Ind. was 10 seconds. They led by two, with most of their 19-point lead evaporated. Still, they were in the driver’s seat with the ball in their hands.
Dame Sarr inbounded the ball to NPOY favorite Cameron Boozer. He passed it back to Sarr, who quickly flipped it to Cayden Boozer. Boozer tried to toss the ball into the open court ahead, but in came an airborne Silas Demary Jr. He tipped the ball.
Braylon Mullins leaped to recover the rock and sent it ahead to Alex Karaban. Time is ticking. Karaban back to Mullins. Mullins from 35 feet. Bottoms. The perfect swish. One of the greatest shots in college basketball history was delivered by an Indiana-born freshman who had been shooting 19% from 3-point range over his past eight games. It was his only three all night. But it was the one that mattered most, cementing a 73-72 victory that sent UConn to the Final four.
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“The ball ended up bouncing into my hands,” Mullins said postgame. “I threw it to AK, knowing AK had just hit one. We weren’t hitting shots tonight, I thought he was going to put it up but he ended up throwing it back to me. I knew we were running out of time so I thought that was the best opportunity to get a shot up. And then it went in.”
Even though the ball has long since cleared the net, the gravity of the shot still hasn’t sunk in for Mullins.
“It’s going to take some time,” he noted. “I’m still processing it myself right now. We have tomorrow, the day after, and then we’re preparing for Illinois on Saturday. That shot will eventually sink in, but not yet.”
Solo Ball, who watched it from the bench, knew the shot was good from the moment it left Mullins’ hands.
“I knew it was going in to be honest,” Ball said. “I saw it in the air, I saw it spinning and I stood up. And then I just jumped, man. That’s probably the best shot I’ve seen in person in my life.”
Karaban felt like it was the best look the Huskies were going to get at the moment, especially given what Duke’s defense was giving UConn.
“When I saw Braylon, and for some reason I had the gut instinct to pass it to him,” Karaban said. “I looked at the rim and there were five seconds left, and I thought maybe something better could develop. I had Cam Boozer in front of me, which was a harder, more difficult shot, so I passed it to Braylon. When I saw him release it, I was like, that really might go in. It went in, and the Indiana kid sent us to Indianapolis.”
Even though Mullins’ shot will make the headlines and the all-time March Madness shot compilations, the freshman would have never had the opportunity to heave it in without the heroics of Tarris Reed Jr..
The senior has been dominating throughout the NCAA tournament, and this game was another outstanding night among others. The entire UConn squad was anemic for the vast majority of the evening, except for Reed. He scored 12 of UConn’s first 16 points and added 14 more in the final frame. He closed with 26 points, nine rebounds, four blocks, three assists, and two steals, leading the Huskies in each of those categories.
“Keeping the team alive,” Reed started on his mindset. “I know we weren’t hitting a lot of shots in the first half and I was dominating down low in the post. Being able to keep the team alive and tell the guys ‘keep shooting the shots you’re shooting, shots are going to fall. We have a lot of trust in each other. It’s not always going to be my night, but everyone’s bought into the program and the system.”
Aside from assisting on the shot of the year and hitting a clutch three to cut the deficit to one, Karaban did not have his best outing. He was cold, totaling five points on 10 shots. Even with his muted overall output, Karaban did well to keep the team composed. After all, he’d been in this type of moment many times before. It would have been a tough pill for Karaban to swallow had he gone out on a performance like this, but he didn’t. He’s still dancing.
Duke was one of the three best teams in college basketball and was considered a frontrunner to win the championship. They have one of the best efficiency ratings on KenPom ever, even higher than UConn’s in 2024. That’s why this game is all the crazier, with shades of UConn’s national title upset over the Blue Devils in 1999.
Cam Boozer played his heart out in his lone season in Durham, NC and finished this game with 27 points and eight boards. While this collapse does partially fall on him, he was certainly the best Blue Devil on the floor.
Connecticut started the game down, but showed considerable fight early. The Blue Devils were firing on all cylinders, with Reed as the only Husky putting up a fight. UConn was down by double-figures by the time the game was seven minutes old and things looked bleak.
Malachi Smith and Demary did well to cut the lead to five with a shot each, but Duke was not going to let them back into the game. The Blue Devils ripped off a 14-0 run over a five minute span, ballooning their lead out to 19. The Huskies did their best to stem the tide, heading into the locker room still down by 15.
As for Dan Hurley’s message in the locker room? He implored his squad to take things step by step.
“He was trying to keep the positivity up, just telling us that you gotta chip away at the lead, play hard, make the right plays,” Mullins noted.
Reed continued his magic into the second half, scoring 11 points in the frame’s first nine minutes. Karaban finally started to produce with a layup and then made a diving save into the stands, keeping a play alive that ended with a Reed jam. That reduced the deficit to just seven and forced a Duke timeout.
Before Demary hit the Huskies’ second and third threes of the night with six minutes left, they had been 1/18 from deep. A Ball and-one layup cut it to two points and Karaban added a triple that made it a single point game. Cam Boozer nailed a hook to make it three and Demary went 1/2 from the stripe. With 10 seconds left in the game, the Huskies worked their magic to escape with an improbable victory.
“Strong men. It takes strong men,” Hurley said on the team’s comeback. “It takes a strong team. It takes a tough team. It takes strong men. It takes a bunch of players that let us coach them, let us coach them hard. That starts in June. We run a very intense program.”
The Huskies now head to the Final Four, continuing what feels like a fairytale run. They could have been knocked out several times throughout the tournament, but they’re still breathing.
Their next chance to spread the pixie dust will come this Saturday at 6 p.m. against Illinois on TBS. UConn defeated the Illini back in November, winning by 13 points. Both teams have grown a lot since then, so it should be an exhilarating matchup.
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