ARLINGTON, Texas - Kentucky had the roster loaded with soon-to-be NBA lottery picks. It had the fame and the preseason No. 1 ranking. It had the star coach, so big the country is on a one-name basis with him.
Yet when the buzzer sounded Monday night, Connecticut had what really mattered.
The NCAA title.
UConn might not be the best team in terms of pure talent or future earning potential. But heart will outweigh talent any day - especially when it's paired with the slickest guards in the game.
'It took a special team,' Ryan Boatright said.
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No one outside the state of Connecticut gave the Huskies any shot at being the last guys standing when the NCAA tournament began. Heck, few gave them a shot when the title game tipped off. But there is something special about these Huskies, a steeliness forged in the darkness of last season.
Banned from the postseason for years of poor academic scores, they became the poster children of all that was wrong with college athletics, a team that would sacrifice academics for athletic success. Never mind that the sins had been committed long before most of these Huskies had even set foot on campus.
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Although the punishment brought them closer as a team, it hardened them, too.
'This is what happens when you ban us,' said Shabazz Napier.
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Doubters and deficits in games no longer mattered, as they showed time and again during their run through the tournament. Villanova. Iowa State. Michigan State. Florida.
One by one, the teams that were supposed to contend for the championship fell while the afterthought Huskies rolled on.
'The last shall be first,' said Kevin Ollie, coach of an NCAA champion in just his second year as a head coach. 'We were last and now we're first. But we always did it together.'
The Huskies had erased deficits of nine points or more in three of their NCAA tournament games, seeming to play their best when their backs were stuck to the wall. Not on this night, though.
Napier and Ryan Boatright were considered perhaps the best backcourt in the nation, and there can be no doubt about it now. Teammates for three years, they have an almost telepathic connection on the court, with Napier making how-did-he-do-that? passes that only Boatright could grab.
Kentucky had no answer for the duo, who left the Wildcats clutching at air time and again as UConn raced out to a 15-point lead late in the first half. But the Wildcats have a grittiness to go with their gilded pedigree, too, and they weren't going to go away.
They pulled within two with six minutes left, and it looked as if the title might be slipping away from the Huskies. Napier was barking at teammates, unhappy with their sudden sloppiness and rushed shots. Boatright, meanwhile, had twisted his ankle, grimacing as he tried to walk it off.
Ollie gave him an encouraging rub on the head, and Boatright took a couple more tentative steps before nodding his head and settling into his defensive stance.
After a rare turnover by Napier - following a steal of his own, he was caught from behind by Andrew Harrison - Boatright drilled a jumper at the shot clock.
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When UConn got the ball back with nine seconds left, the Huskies began jumping up and down at the bench. As the clock ticked down to two, they started rushing the court. When the final buzzer sounded, Boatright slammed the ball to the floor, let out a primal scream and popped the front of his jersey, so there could be no more doubt.
This was UConn's title, had been all along. They were just the only ones who'd known it.
'I want to get everyone's attention right quick,' Napier said as he and his teammates partied among the blue and white confetti. 'Ladies and gentlemen, you are looking at the Hungry Huskies. This is what happens.'
Heart and hunger. That is what champions are made of.
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