HOUSTON — In any normal championship game, say, one that was not a heavyweight title fight decided on a final-punch knockout at the 12th-round bell, Phil Booth would have been the star. He would have been remembered for the shot of the game, as the champion’s high scorer, maybe the Most Outstanding Player.
But this was no normal game. Not in any respect.
So, the sophomore from Baltimore will have to settle for a different sort of immortality. As the reserve who not only didn’t scare on the big stage but also made it his home Monday night.
There was a crucible moment for Booth’s Villanova Wildcats with North Carolina on a 7-0 run and looking like the favorites it was to win it all. The 'Cats had come up empty on three straight possessions, the ball never hitting the rim — a bad pass by Ryan Arcidiacono, a blocked runner by Josh Hart, an air-ball runner by Booth, altered by UNC’s phenom big man Brice Johnson.
This was looking like the fourth empty trip with Booth having picked up his dribble in the paint, the Tar Heels’ towering bigs lurking.
“End of the shot clock, I had a bigger guy on me,” Booth remembered. “So, I was trying to penetrate and get into the lane and look for an open guy and look for a shot.”
But the options were all unappealing ones. There was Booth, caught in the middle of the lane, the clock almost expired and it looking very much like a turnover, one the Wildcats could ill-afford. They had been just a tad shaky in the knees ever since mounting a 10-point lead with under five minutes to play. A desperate band of Tar Heels was coming at them with the fervor of cornered carnivores.
Suddenly the Wildcats' 67-57 lead had shrunk to 67-64 with the clock still above 3:00. And another UNC stop looked ominous.
“Nobody was open,” Booth said. “That was great defense. They have big guys who can really move laterally.”
That’s when Booth made what could have been the shot of the game — if not for the crashing-cymbals crescendo finish of all time to follow. He pivoted for the third time, faded back with the lean of a drunken limbo competitor, and lofted in a 12-footer that changed the game.
OK, well, it should have. But events transpired to practically erase the shot from relevance of Villanova's 77-74 national championship win (see game story). It shouldn’t be so.
Hart was not surprised.
“He’s always had that in him," Hart said of Booth. "You’re supposed to always focus on getting in the lane, pivoting, being strong with the ball. Now, throughout the year, there were times where he’d get in the lane and get stripped, lose the ball.
“Not today. He grew up. He came in and he was strong with the ball. People were swatting at it. He never lost it, never panicked in there.”
In fact, the kid from Mount St. Joseph’s High, a Catholic school power in Baltimore, did nothing but make big plays all game. He led the 'Cats with 20 points and nearly didn’t miss a shot — 6 of 7 from the field including both his three-pointers, 6 of 6 from the free throw line.
Oh, the free throw line. His final two foul shots were merely with 36 seconds left and the Wildcats then clinging to a 70-69 lead.
“They were just like any other free throws,” Booth said. “Do your routine, take your time, deep breath, knock it down. You don’t get caught up in the moment. You just focus.”
How can a reserve, albeit one who’s usually first or second off the bench, play with that sort of confidence?
“The team has so much confidence in each other,” Booth said. “We play an offense that doesn’t run through anybody.
“So, everybody puts confidence in me to make shots. If you’re open, you shoot the ball. It doesn’t matter who it is. If it’s the right play to make, shoot it.
“It just so happened I was making shots and they were kind of denying Kris (Jenkins) and Arch and Josh a lot. So, the shots were open for me.”
And under several layers of subsequent drama lay his shot at the end of the first half, a classic momentum swinger that got the Wildcats within a five-point deficit when it could have been nine. Hart hustled to swat a Justin Jackson shot with eight seconds left in the half. He flung it up the court and Booth ended up threading through traffic. In the John Wooden-approved method, he was quick but didn’t rush, got to a sweet spot just inside the foul line and hit from 12 feet just before the buzzer sounded for intermission.
Jay Wright had seen this poise before.
“You know what?" Wright said. "He did that as a freshman last year.”
Not just in the regular season but in his first NCAA Tournament. In the otherwise desultory 71-68 loss to NC State last season, Booth was fearless, hitting 3 of 4 treys in 14 minutes. But when it came time to trust someone late in a game in which the Wildcats played from behind the entire second half, Wright chose junior Dylan Ennis.
Wrong choice. Ennis wilted.
“Phil never complained, never said a word,” Wright said.
Ennis ended up transferring to Oregon, where he ripped up his knee in the opener and didn’t play at all this year.
Wright did not forget what happened last March when this April played its last date.
“When he was feeling it in this game, we had a decision at the end," Wright said. "Do we go with the guy coming off the bench or go back to Jalen Brunson, the starter, who had a great year?
“This time, we went with Phil. And it worked out.”
You might say.