NCAA Championship Game: Worst Game in College Basketball History?

On Monday, the University of Connecticut Huskies won the NCAA National Championship, beating the Butler Bulldogs by a score of 53-41. UConn wasn’t even ranked before the season, and Butler only made the tournament because they won their conference championship.

Knowing these facts prior to the season coupled with being told that these two teams would play in the national championship game, you would have said it'd be a terrible game to watch.

And you would be correct.

Butler shot 18.8 percent, the lowest field goal percentage in the history of the championship game.

You could say that the setting played a role, but most of last year's championship-losing Butler team was back for a second chance. They had been there before, so that shouldn’t have affected them too much.

Next argument: UConn played great defense. They did play good D, but Butler still got good looks and missed a lot of shots. How many post moves by Butler's players beat UConn defenders, but went on to simply missing the shot?

Was UConn the best basketball team in the nation? They were certainly the best tournament team, or, more accurately, had the most clutch player. But the Huskies still finished ninth in the Big East.

Again, Butler wasn’t even in the NCAA Tournament until they won their conference's automatic bid.

Why, then, were we forced to witness such a terrible game on the highest stage in college basketball? Because the best players no longer stay in college, and leave for the NBA as soon as possible.

When ESPN's Bill Simmons asked Steve Kerr about the difference in the level of play in college basketball versus the NBA, his response was, ”I don’t even consider it anymore.”

Before 1995, when all players went to college and stayed for a few years, teams like UConn and Butler never would have made it this far in the tournament. Think about the early-'90s UNLV teams, the two-time champion Duke teams, the Fab Five teams and the 1996 Kentucky team.

Those were the last of the great teams in college basketball.

We won’t see any team in the future that deserves to be on the same floor as those teams until the NBA makes kids stay in school for a minimum of three years.

Still, you can’t take this championship away from UConn. A championship is a championship, no matter who you played. For this year, the Huskies were the best team in college basketball.

It is Jim Calhoun's third national championship, putting him in the company of Wooden, Rupp, Knight and Krzyzewski. But this was by far his worst team of the three, and very likely not even one of his top 10 UConn teams.