139: Timing is everything
A look back at the 2025 National Title game, plus triangle hoops over the past five decades.
Basketball games are decided by countless small events. We often focus on what happened and how it happened, but not when it happened. Timing can be everything.
But we often overlook when those events happened.
Florida beat Houston 65-63 Monday night to win the 2025 National Championship. Here is a summary of the collection of events from that game:
Houston attempted 13 more shots than Florida
Florida was called for two technical fouls, but Houston committed eight more fouls overall (19 to 11)
Houston turned the ball over on fewer possessions (13.1%) than Florida (18.9%)
If we look at when these events occurred, it gives us more insight into how and why Houston lost.
Houston is a team that thrives on creating extra possessions through turnovers and offensive rebounds. Though Gonzaga, Purdue, and Duke each shot better against them, the Cougars still eliminated all three of those teams.
Houston won games all tournament and all season through shot volume. But when it mattered most, Houston failed to even attempt a shot on its final three possessions, all with the game in the balance.
I don’t expect you to know these three names: Doug Sirmons, Terry Oglesby, and Ron Groover. The officiating crew Monday night put on a masterclass in trying to make things even.
The first half saw just four combined fouls. Then, in a 71 second stretch early in the second half, officials called seven fouls, including a technical foul against the Florida bench.
11 of the next 12 fouls were against the Cougars before yet another technical foul was whistled against Florida, this time because Rueben Chinyelu bounced the ball too high after being whistled for another foul.
I imagine it’s rare for a team to win an NCAA Tournament game after receiving two technical fouls. Even so, Florida only committed 11 fouls in total. Without the technicals, that number drops to nine—which would be the fewest number of fouls by a team that won a title since 19851.
This brings us to turnovers. All turnovers are not created equal, but in general, a turnover negates any chance at a shot attempt. And when these turnovers happened in this game mattered a ton.
Florida committed nine first-half turnovers to Houston’s two turnovers. But the Gators cleaned things up and didn’t turn the ball over once in the final 9:34 of game time.
Houston, meanwhile, had nine total turnovers in the game, but three of those turnovers came in the final three possessions, with the game on the line.
Basketball games come down to a series of small events, and when those events happen often determine the outcome. A year from now, we may remember the score and a bungled final possession. But most of us probably won’t remember the foul count going from non-existent to frequent or Florida’s pristine avoidance of turnovers over the final nine minutes of the game.
We’ll use this result, and others from the tournament, to push our favorite narratives: that roster continuity is more important than ever or how you don’t need 5-star high school players anymore or how the ACC hurt Duke by not preparing them with enough close games2.
But remember, just before a trend changes, there will be maximum agreement that the trend will not end.
Triangle hoops over the last five decades
That brings us to the Old North State and the Triangle, which is home to three storied programs. After a week of people calling Duke likable, the public got a reminder of how fun it is to root against them. Devils, after all, are supposed to be villains.
The banter that followed Duke’s incomprehensible loss was familiar:
Carolina fans mocking Duke’s title drought despite its elite talent
Duke fans reminding everyone they swept UNC
State fans hopeful that a new coach marks the end of mediocrity
Last week, I shared a chart of Carolina’s performance over the past five decades in the ACC and NCAA Tournaments. And now it’s time to view the performance of all three programs over the past five decades3.
There’s a lot to unpack in the graphic, but just like individual games, each decade is shaped by the timing of a lot of small moments.
Next season, and hopefully the rest of the decade, should be fun with these three programs competing against each other.
🤟 Thanks for reading this far. A recommendation this week, check out d1baseball.com and specifically, the game-by-game lineup tool. As college basketball ends, it feels like it’s time to start paying closer attention to college baseball as the season heads into its fifth inning 🤟
Data via stathead.com (Kentucky committed 10 fouls in a loss to UConn in the 2014 title game, North Carolina committed 10 fouls in its 1993 win over Michigan).
Correlation does not imply causation, but boy do we love to talk about how the ACC stinks.
Decades include the season's final year (i.e. 2009-10 is part of the 2010s). If this doesn’t sound right to you, I’m sorry, because it’s how I grouped the data.