Chapter 323 1997 NCAA Division I Men“s Basketball Tournament 11

"Just as you said the Tar Heels team played very poorly at the beginning of this second half, it could be said that besides Jake it was the worst game of that team this season and what"s worse in the Final Four game against a strong team like Arizona Wildcats team."

"True, it can"t happen to either team playing a part of the game as badly as the Tar Heels team has been playing, but we have to also say about Jake"s 15 points in those first 10 minutes of the second half."

"Anyone who hears about this thinks he"s playing quietly, but no, sometimes there are two players in defense against him, and Jake can find s.p.a.ce to try the three-point shot, even though he missed two shots off, the moment the team lives in the game, Jake"s 15 points is even more important."

Coach Smith called the whole team to talk after asking for a break, only Jake received no scolding from the coach, after which the players seemed to have cheered up a bit.

Jake knew that in the second half the Tar Heels team could not play very well, so he just tried to make the right plays with Jamison and Carter who were playing better in today"s game.

In another move Jake received the ball and advanced calmly, after pa.s.sing the middle of the court he pa.s.sed the ball to Carter, Carter advanced the ball and pa.s.sed to Okulaja, Okulaja held the ball and pa.s.sed to Jake behind the three-point line.

Jake made a feint that deceived Bibby and made an alley-oop for Carter to catch the ball in the air and make a dunk to score 2 points for Team Tar Heels, the end of the game was coming and Jake made 2 alley-oop with Jamison also in this second time.

Thus at the end of the game the team, Tar Heels won by 92 points against 52 of the Arizona Wildcats team, Jake played for 20 minutes in that second half and made 22 points, 4 a.s.sists, 9 rebounds, 6 steals, and 6 blocks.

Coach Smith did not want to risk a difficult game like this and let Jake play the 40 minutes of the game, and it was the right decision because Jake was the one who ensured Tar Heels"s victory in that game.

"What an exciting game, even though not playing well, the Tar Heels team managed an easy win with a great performance from Jake and a good game from Carter and Jamison."

"This was certainly a game in which the team Tar Heels only won because Jake was in the team, he made a quadruple-double in that game with over 40 points scored, so what Jake did in the first half of the first half we can see how he led the team to this victory."

"After this game where Jake led the team alone to the NCAA tournament win and final, I think there"s no doubt that he deserves the best player of the year at the university and the NCAA Tournament MVP award."

"True, we hope that the players from the Tar Heels team will play better in the next game, only if all players perform well will the Tar Heels team have a chance to win this NCAA tournament."

After this end of the game the team Tar Heels returned to university, all the way Coach Smith said nothing to the players and with that everyone was more nervous, even with that win and the team going to the NCAA tournament final, no one was happy about it for the team"s performance.

Only Jake was more relaxed and was quite happy with the team going to the NCAA tournament final, he naturally knew that the team would not perform well in this game and just hoped that because of it they could play better.

So he was undecided about whether the team could win this game even with him playing, which is also why he told Coach Smith to ask the players to defend against Simon after all the team played this game well and helped to win.

Jake was already preparing well before to have to take responsibility and play very well in this game, he made another quadruple-double and the most important was that the team won.

Also, with Carter and Jamison playing very well in today"s game it made it much easier for Jake to play so well and for the team to win, Jake always thought that with two other players besides him playing well they could win almost any game.

As soon as everyone got to college Coach Smith found everyone at the Dean Smith Center to talk to the players, everyone on the team besides Jake was nervous, even Carter and Jamison who had made a great game were nervous about this conversation.

"I"ll have to say, after this game I couldn"t help but be disappointed with our team, even if I didn"t expect much from you in this game I would still be disappointed, so imagine how I was even more disappointed when I expected you to were the champions of this NCAA tournament?"

The players were all quiet and ashamed as they listened to what Coach Smith was saying, the worst for them was that they had betrayed the coach and fans" confidence in this game.

"I"ll a.s.sume that I have some fault with that too, the team had been playing so well and in the last game we had maybe the best performance this season that I thought didn"t need to talk to you guys to play well in this game."

"I just didn"t think it was the same team as the last game, it looks like in a week off you got worse than you were before, I didn"t expect that."

"Defensively at least you had a good performance on this game, Carter and Jamison also played well and especially Jake who saved our team from losing this game even when the whole team was playing poorly."

"Our next game is this season"s final and the NCAA tournament final, I don"t even have to say how important this game is to your basketball career or even to the life of those who don"t want to go pro."

"If you win the next game all of your names will be in history as is the name of Michael Jordan and many other players, in two days we will have this game so I will let you rest, don"t let me down again in this final."

Jake was the only one more relaxed with this conversation, he just sat down and pretended that Coach Smith wasn"t talking to him, after all, he knew he had done very well in this game and all season, but he had to admit that the coach Smith knew how to motivate players.

He showed his dislike for this last game and criticized the team while praising who had a good game and the team"s good defense, which is why he has managed to coach the team so well for many years and win several t.i.tles.

Jake was perhaps the only one who knew this year would be Dean Smith"s last year as coach of the Tar Heels team, so even though it seemed that Coach Smith didn"t like him very much, Jake was still trying to learn as much as he could from him, especially in training.

Jake later celebrated with his friends who also went to watch the game and with Eva, Eva had said that if Jake was the NCAA tournament final she would definitely go with Anna to watch the game even having to close the restaurant for a day.

In fact, Jake didn"t know, but Eva had already refused months of reservation at the restaurant for the day of the NCAA tournament"s final game, showing how confident she was that Jake"s team would reach the final.

Jake was much more relaxed about the next game that hadn"t happened in his past life, so he didn"t have to worry about a lot of things and just play the best he could.

The downside to this was that he couldn"t know who was playing well before the game began, but with Jake"s intelligence and his familiarity with his teammates within minutes he would know who was playing well or not.

Jake"s roommates were even more excited than he for this game, they were surprised to learn that Jake was on the college basketball team, but they could never imagine that Jake would become the team"s first player in his first year and that Tar Heels team reached the NCAA tournament final.

The Tar Heels players were already like idols to the other college students who followed and liked basketball, Jake especially that even trying to be humble drew a lot of attention in the cla.s.ses he attended, especially for the good grades he had.

William and the others naturally also had more friends and some even had a few girlfriends for a short time just being Jake"s roommates and friends, only Jake in the cla.s.s had no relations.h.i.+p this year.

The other day while the players rested Tiffany and Clara, as well as John and Alan, appeared as Jake"s sponsors to watch the game the other day and to congratulate Jake on this great achievement.

Knowing this Jake first scheduled lunch to talk with John and Alan earlier and a dinner to talk with Tiffany and Clara, after all even though they were his sponsors, Jake treated them differently.

Jake hoped everyone would come right before the final game, even if Jake had a contract prohibiting him from relating his sponsors to college basketball, it was obvious that Jake was playing so well and his team was in the NCAA tournament final is very good for his sponsors.

"Congratulations Jake, it was a great debut season you had at college basketball this year."

"That"s right, coming to the NCAA tournament final and winning the ACC tournament is an amazing start."