The last weekend of the regular season couldn’t have gone any better for Miami had Hurricanes coach Jim Larranaga sat down and arranged it himself.
First, his team beat Virginia Tech 69-68 at home to sweep the season series and stretch Miami’s winning streak to four games. All were one-possession affairs at the end, starting with a 77-74 win at Notre Dame on Feb. 19.
By the standards of what was to follow, that game was a veritable “blowout,” being decided when center Ebuku Izundu had a put-back to give Miami a five-point lead with 11.1 seconds remaining. The Irish hit a couple of free throws in the remaining time for the final margin.
The Hurricanes followed that up with a 79-78 win over Boston College with guard Lonnie Walker’s 3-pointer with 2.4 seconds left completing a comeback from a 9-point deficit over the last two minutes.
They went back on the road and beat North Carolina 91-88 on guard Ja’Quan Newton’s running 30-footer at the buzzer after Carolina’s Joel Berry II had hit a 3 to give the Tar Heels an 88-88 tie with 4.1 seconds remaining.
And then came Saturday against the Hokies, when guard Chris Lykes hit the first of a 1-and-1 free throw award to break a 68-68 deadlock with only 3.0 seconds on the clock. He missed the second, but that played in Miami’s favor when the Hokies were able to get off only a long desperation shot that not only wasn’t close but came after the buzzer.
That gave Miami a 22-8 overall record and 11-7 finish in the conference race. With his team’s game having started at noon, Larranaga planned an evening with his wife-dinner and maybe a movie-while the other results began to trickle in to decide the Hurricane’s ACC tourney seed.
Each domino that came in the rest of the day fell his way. First, Clemson lost 55-52 to Syracuse even though the Orange went without a field goal over the final 8:45.
Then North Carolina State knocked off Louisville 76-69, holding the Cardinals scoreless for a six-minute span while going on a 13-0 run in the second half.
And then the Big One. Duke rallied from 10 down at the half to beat North Carolina 74-64.
The result was four teams (Clemson, Miami, North Carolina, and N.C. State) all finishing the regular season with 11-7 conference marks. In the case of multi-team ties, the records of the teams involved against each breaks the ties, and though Clemson had three wins (Miami, North Carolina, and N.C. State), its two losses (N.C. State, North Carolina) left the Tigers with a .600 percentage to Miami’s .667 (wins over N.C. State and North Carolina and a single loss to Clemson) for the No. 3 seed.
Such are the vagaries of the ACC’s unbalanced schedule.
The Tigers, however, did wind up with the No. 4 seed and the double-bye that goes with it and won’t play until Thursday against one of a trio that includes N.C. State, Boston College, and Georgia Tech. They likely will face No. 1 seed and regular-season champion Virginia in Friday’s semifinals.
With the No. 3 seed, the Hurricanes face the likelihood of playing North Carolina (assuming the Tar Heels get by the winner of the Syracuse-Wake Forest first-round game) Thursday in the quarterfinals. If they survive that, a semifinal date with Duke likely awaits the Hurricanes Friday.
Though getting the double-bye was the immediate reward of the four-game winning streak, the residual impact was to boost Miami’s seeding for the NCAA Tournament that follows. Unless they play miserably this week, the Hurricanes likely will be awarded a better seed than the 8-9 they once seemed destined for (at least according to some tourney speculators).
It’s a remarkable achievement considering that they have played their last 10 games without guard Bruce Brown, who had foot surgery in early February. Brown was second on the team in scoring (11.4 ppg) and the leading rebounder (7.1) when he went down, but his contributions go beyond mere numbers.
“Bruce was really our emotional leader,” Larranaga said recently. “He has a lot of great qualities as a person and I think one of the things is he has such a high competitive spirit. I think that’s what’s going to carry him in his lifetime, that he likes challenges and he rises to the occasion whenever he is challenged.
“When we lost him we were able for a short period of time to make up for his loss.”
The Hurricanes won their first three without Brown, but two of them were wins over Pittsburgh (winless in league play) and Wake Forest, a 14th-place club. Three losses followed, including a devastating defeat at Boston College when the Hurricanes went the last six minutes without scoring, before the Hurricanes got right again.
Whether Brown will be available for the NCAA tourney is still in doubt. He is due to be checked again Monday, which, of course, will be the day after bids are issued and seeds determined. The NCAA may be taking into consideration, say, Bonzie Colson’s return from injury for Notre Dame, but Miami isn’t likely to get similar treatment since Brown’s status won’t be known.
Still, the rotation of forward Dewan Huell (11.6 ppg), guard Lonnie Walker (11.6), Lykes (9.7), guard Anthony Lawrence (8.8), and Newton (8.5) starting and 3-point specialist DJ Vasiljevic (9.1), Izundu (5.0) and forward Sam Waardenburg (3.5) coming off the bench has become worthy on its own credentials.
“Confidence is a huge part of success, believing in yourself,” Larranaga said after the final win over Virginia Tech. “I think our guys have developed a lot of confidence in themselves and in their teammates.”
