To celebrate 30 years of SLAM, we’re featuring the 30 most influential men’s college teams of the past 30 years. Stats, records and chips are not the main factor here, it’s all about their contribution to the cultural fabric of the game.
Over the next 30 days, Monday through Friday, we’ll be featuring full list here. We also have an exclusive retro collegiate collection out now that pays homage to the threads of each squad. Shop here.
Entering the 2011 season, UConn was unranked in all preseason polls and was picked to finish 10th in the Big East. They were just coming off a mediocre season where they failed to make the NCAA Tournament for the second time in four years. So people had already written them off as a threat in the Big East, let alone a national title contender.
In other words, a lot of fuel was being added to the fire already brewing in these Huskies; The Huskies squad was led by the 6-foot, 172-pound star guard from the Bronx.
All eyes were on Kemba Walker, who returned in 2011. season young with high expectations. He’s already become a fan favorite who’s proven to score in bunches, always in a fresh pair of retro Js, but can he make an impact winning at a high level? Can you count on him to lead UConn back to glory?
Don’t get it twisted, though; Kemba had a well-rounded team around him. Among them were two star freshmen, point guard Shabazz Napier and swingman Jeremy Lamb, who would each become first-round NBA draft picks themselves. But was that enough? Will their lack of experience get in the way? UConn had plenty of talent, but how consistent could they be?
Lots of questions, but UConn had the cheat sheet.
They went undefeated through their non-conference schedule, winning ten straight before entering Big East play, including wins over No. 2 Michigan State and No. 8 Kentucky. During that tenure, UConn was ranked No. 4 in the AP poll and appeared poised to make a run at the Big East crown.
Anyone who knows anything about college hoops in the 2000s and 2010s knows that every Big East matchup was a dogfight. On any given night, UConn can convincingly beat a top-10 team like Georgetown or lose by 15 to unranked St. John’s. It was an up and down conference type table for them. They finished a disappointing ninth in the Big East and entered the Big East Tournament losing four of their last five games.
Well, the way March Madness was set up, the Huskies were in the perfect position to take the country by storm.
They swept their first two games of the Big East tournament, earning a quarterfinal rematch against Pittsburgh (the Big East regular-season champion who knocked them out in December). This time, in March, the stakes were different.
The game was tied at 74. 7 seconds left on the clock. UConn ball.
Everyone knew who fired the last shot. It was not important. On a mismatch at the top of the key, Kemba hit a smooth right-to-left hessie, took a hard offensive dribble from the left, stopped on a dime, stepped back and went up for his perfect jumper as a helpless defender tripped. on the ground. The ball bounced through the net, Madison Square Garden erupted, and a college basketball legend was born.
“It was a special moment in UConn history. I turned to my assistants as we were leaving the court and said, “We have something special going on,” recalled retired UConn Hall of Fame head coach Jim Calhoun in a 2016 interview.
Coach Calhoun couldn’t be more right. Kemba and the Huskies sealed the deal two days later and won the Big East Tournament. That’s five days, five games and five wins. A truly unprecedented run. But next up was the NCAA tournament. They need to win six more games in a row to be the last team to cut down the nets. Surely they couldn’t keep playing with the same intensity after just surviving the Big East gauntlet, right?
Uh, wrong.
Kemba played like a man possessed. the team went as he did. In the NCAA tournament, he averaged 23.5 points, 6 rebounds and 5.6 assists to lead the program to their third national championship in a win over Butler, beating future Hall of Famers like Kawhi Leonard and blue bloods like Kentucky (for the second time) : the road
The 2011 UConn team represents everything we love about college basketball; From immortality to the top of the ladder, the 2011 UConn Huskies were forever immortalized in basketball history.
Photos via Getty Images.
