For these 8 players, NCAA Tournament provided a true March moment

The NCAA Tournament is now upon us, ready to give dreamers a chance — to reach the Final Four, to enjoy the final basketball experience of their life and for the lucky few, to enhance their profile enough to get the NBA’s attention.

It’s a weekly showcase between now and the championship game where the basketball world witnesses the players who rise to the occasion and flick away the pressure and urgency. Not everyone is built for this.

What’s surprising is a vast majority of NBA players never experienced long NCAA Tournament runs, and those who did were fortunate to play for the usual college basketball powerhouses: Stephon Castle (UConn), Al Horford (Florida) and De’Andre Hunter (Virginia) won championships while the likes of Cooper Flagg (Duke) reached the Final Four, all with highly-seeded teams, all quite expectedly.

As for players who truly qualified as Cinderellas? The tournament became their last dance; they either had very short NBA careers or none at all, though there are exceptions.

Here’s an Elite Eight list — in alphabetical order — of current NBA players who made unexpected tournament runs, a name for themselves and made the most of their march through March:

• Stephen Curry, Davidson, 2008. This was a perfect storm in multiple ways — the son of a former NBA star, steering a school that hadn’t won a tournament game since 1969, dropping shots from long range and doing it just as the world turned digital.

A few details are forgotten, in hindsight: Davidson didn’t make it to the Final Four and neither the school nor Curry made the NCAA Tournament the following year, Curry’s last at Davidson. Doesn’t matter. This run was precisely what defines the tournament and its ability to weave magic.

Curry had a baby face and a sinister smile. His touch was golden. Davidson was a 10th seed that beat No. 7 Gonzaga, then No. 2 Georgetown, when Curry scored 30 points, then he gave 33 to No. 3 Wisconsin in the Sweet 16. He nearly beat No. 1 Kansas in the Elite Eight, losing by two. Curry averaged 32 points per game during the run.

Postscript: Curry caused some NBA teams a bit of worry before the 2009 Draft, as they wondered if he was a shooter trapped inside a point guard’s body. Also, he wanted to go to the New York Knicks. The Minnesota Timberwolves passed on him not once, but twice — taking point guards each time (Ricky Rubio at No. 5, Jonny Flynn at No. 6). Curry didn’t last to the Knicks at No. 8 because the then-lowly Golden State Warriors wisely snatched him at No. 7. And the rest is history.

• Anthony Davis, Kentucky, 2012. Sure, this is blue-blood Kentucky and the Wildcats were among the favorites to win the championship, which they did. This was no Cinderella story.

However, here’s the fine print — Davis rumbled through the NCAA Tournament dominantly despite being an afterthought offensively. Nobody ever did that before, especially to win the Most Outstanding Player award in the Final Four. That’s the surprise.

Davis took only the fourth-most shots on Kentucky’s team that season. In the tournament, he averaged 14.2 ppg, 11.2 rpg and 4.6 bpg. In the championship game against Kansas, he didn’t score in the first 9 1/2 minutes and shot 1-for-10 overall. But he had 16 rebounds and six blocks.

Postscript: Davis was drafted first overall in 2012 on the strength of his defense, but gradually became one of the league’s best two-way players. He averaged 13 points as a rookie and hasn’t dipped under 20 points since.

• “The Gonzaga Guys,” Gonzaga, 2017 and 2021. You almost can’t have an NCAA Tournament without Gonzaga, so in that sense, this school hardly qualifies as a dark horse. However, it is a mid-major. And since John Stockton created a basketball tradition there, Gonzaga seems forever linked to March, generating hope that at some point, a little school will finally topple one of the bigger programs and produce a true Shining Moment.

Gonzaga got close in those two years, losing to North Carolina and Baylor, respectively, in the championship game. Rui Hachimura and Zach Collins led the ’17 team. The loss to Baylor was more painful because Gonzaga was the favorite, winning 31 straight until then. The core of that team — Corey Kispert, Andrew Nembhard, Jalen Suggs and Julian Strawther — are all currently on NBA rosters.

Postscript: Chet Holmgren was the nation’s top recruit and signed with Gonzaga the following year. His 2022 tournament run ended in the regional semifinals, losing to Arkansas star (and future Oklahoma City teammate) Jaylin Williams.

• CJ McCollum, Lehigh, 2012. A few years before hauling an engineering school to the tournament, he was a slightly built and lightly regarded high school prospect. Strange but true: McCollum was 5-foot-2 as a prep freshman, and despite being Mr. Basketball in Ohio as a senior, the blue blood programs stayed away. Hello, Lehigh.

He helped a No. 15-seed beat a No. 2-seed for only the sixth time in history when Lehigh toppled Duke. McCollum had 30 in that game and, given the magnitude of the feat, made headlines everywhere.

He previously had 26 points in a loss to Kansas in the 2010 NCAA Tournament when he was the leading freshman scorer in the nation.

Postscript: The big colleges passed on him, but not the NBA. McCollum was drafted 10th in 2013 by the Portland Trail Blazers and teamed with another small-school hero, Damian Lillard of Weber State, to form one of the league’s best backcourts.

• Evan Mobley, USC, 2021. Mobley was one of the best players in his high school class, so having an impact in college wasn’t totally unexpected. But he chose a football school. And as the No. 6 seed, USC beat Kansas by 34 points, which is the worst defeat in KU tournament history. Imagine if that flipped in football: Kansas beating USC by 34. That’s how stunning it was.

Mobley had 10 points and 13 rebounds in that game, then punctuated a win over Oregon with a massive dunk that became a signature play in the tourney. USC finally ran out of magic against Gonzaga in the West Regional final. Also, Mobley had the fortune of playing alongside his brother, Isaiah, during the run.

Postscript: Last season, he was the Kia Defensive Player of the Year, an All-Star and made the All-NBA Second Team.

• “The Nova Knicks” (Jalen Brunson, Donte DiVincenzo, Josh Hart and Mikal Bridges), Villanova, 2016. This was the first of two championships by Brunson, DiVincenzo, Hart and Bridges, and was more surprising than two years later when they were heavy favorites. Villanova beat four top-three seeds during the run and won most of their games easily — by 30 points in the first round, 19 in the second, 23 in the Sweet 16 and 34 in the national semifinal over No. 2 Oklahoma (largest in Final Four history). That was the shock because ‘Nova lost the Big East tournament championship to Seton Hall.

Also, Brunson and DiVincenzo were freshmen, and neither was the best guard on the team. That honor went to Ryan Arcidiacono, the Most Outstanding Player in the Final Four. Additionally, Kris Jenkins, who didn’t have an NBA career, made the title-winning shot over No. 1 North Carolina.

Postscript: Well, you know. Just check the Knicks’ roster.

• Collin Sexton, Alabama, 2018. He wasn’t coached by Nick Saban, of course, but by Avery Johnson (the former NBA championship-winning point guard with the Spurs). And he quarterbacked the Crimson Tide, just without pads. Yes, ‘Bama actually did play basketball, and Sexton, their point guard, gave the campus something to enjoy between spring football practice and the football season opener in September.

There’s a disclaimer here: Sexton’s March Madness was mainly confined to the SEC tournament. He beat Texas A&M on a buzzer-beater, then he dropped 31 points on top-seeded Auburn before Bama fell to mighty Kentucky in the semis despite 21 from Sexton. But he did sparkle in the first round of the NCAA Tournament with a victory over Virginia Tech before losing to Villanova, the eventual NCAA champ.

Postscript: Until Brandon Miller was taken No. 2 by the Charlotte Hornets in 2023, Sexton (No. 8 in 2018, by the Cavaliers) was the highest draft pick from Alabama since Antonio McDyess, No. 2 in 1995. Again, football school.

• Fred VanVleet, Wichita State, 2012-16. He was unique in spending four years in college and putting the Shockers on the NCAA Tournament map. That started his freshman year when he helped Wichita State become just the fifth school with a seed higher than 8 to reach the Final Four. The next year the Shockers went undefeated during the season, and in his junior year his 17 points helped beat No. 2 Kansas in the second round. As a senior, his 16 points and five steals beat No. 6 Arizona.

All told, VanVleet went to the NCAA Tournament all four years and beat higher seeds in three of those years.

Postscript: VanVleet became the most accomplished undrafted player in NBA history, playing a key role in winning the 2019 championship for Toronto and, in 2022, becoming the first undrafted player to be named an All-Star.

* * *

Click here to read article