By: Kyle Auger
Staff Writer
Tonight, Butler and UConn will face tonight in Houston for the crown of national champion.
The UConn Huskies come in as the heavy favorites with their star Kemba Walker, who arguably has been the best player in the country. The Butler Bulldogs come in as the Cinderella tying the record for the lowest seeded team to make the national championship.
Despite being the lowest seed, the appearance of the Bulldogs shouldn’t be a complete surprise. This year’s field was one of the weakest in memory without any real dominant teams. They had a reasonable road to Houston playing an overrated Old Dominion, an impressive game against Pittsburgh, a weak Wisconsin, an athletic Florida and ending with upset-minded Virginia Commonwealth. Also, despite losing last year’s hero Gordon Hayward, they still have coach Brad Stevens, forward Matt Howard, and guard Shelvin Mack.
The Huskies were the team more expected to make to this game, considering their impressive 13-0 record in games within a tournament format. They’ve been led by guard Kemba Walker who has averaged more than 25 points throughout the tournament.
The Bulldogs are attempting to use an interesting strategy to stop the UConn star. Their approach is to let Walker get his 20 – 30 points that he will most likely earn, and stop the rest of the squad. This means they will focus on Alex Oriakhi and Jeremy Lamb, the next best scorers for the Huskies.
Butler enters the game with the utmost hunger after their heart-breaking loss to Duke in last year’s national championship, the game that they almost won that ended in a half court shot rimming out shot by Gordon Hayward.
I believe that the pivotal match up will be between Alex Oriakhi and Matt Howard. Howard is the leading scorer for the Bulldogs, and is known for his outside game despite his 6 foot 8 inch, 230 pound frame and he will need to have a big game to compliment guard Shelvin Mack. Oppositely, Oriakhi makes his living under the hoop averaging almost 10 points and rebounds per game. The Huskies need him to hold up to his 10 points so he can help hold the scoring load with Kemba Walker.
Despite the passion expected by Butler and coach Stevens, I believe Oriakhi will be the X factor, dominating the middle and giving UConn and coach Jim Calhoun their 4th championship.
