Ncaa Basketball Championship

Thousands of fans celebrated at Showalter Fountain on the Indiana University campus in Bloomington, Ind., shortly after the Hoosiers won the NCAA title in New Orleans. "Never since Rome fell has there been such pandemonium in such a small area," said Mike Burdick after Indiana rallied for a 74-73 victory over Syracuse and its fifth NCAA title. The victory sparked a wild celebration despite sub-freezing temperatures, ice-covered sidewalks, chilling winds and four inches of snow on the ground.

Hall of Famer Bob Knight is selling his NCAA basketball championship rings and Olympic gold medal via auction to pay for his grandchildren's education. “John Havlicek and I were just talking one day about all the stuff we had accumulated over the years,” Knight told the Associated Press. Havlicek, who had a Hall of Fame career with the Boston Celtics, and Knight were teammates at Ohio State. “As we talked we decided the money could be very useful to put our grandchildren through college.” The auction, run by Steiner Sports Memorabilia runs through Dec. 5 and will feature Knight's rings from his three NCAA championships when he was coaching at Indiana - the undefeated 1976 season, 1981 and 1987 - and the gold medal he won as coach of the U.S. Olympic team in 1984.

One of the biggest blows to the malady-plagued Kansas team came when Archie Marshall was lost for the season with a knee injury in December. But some good came out of it, as it was only in the absence of Marshall that Milt Newton, who helped spark Kansas past Duke Saturday in the semifinals, began to emerge. Larry Brown and the Kansas players say Marshall has been an inspiration all season, particularly to Danny Manning, who wears Marshall's number, 23, on a wristband during games.

Kenny Heitz, 65, who played on three NCAA basketball championship teams at UCLA in the 1960s, died Monday at his home in Pacific Palisades after a battle with cancer, the school announced. At a time when freshmen were not eligible to play varsity sports, he joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (then Lew Alcindor), Lucius Allen and Lynn Shackelford on the 1965-66 freshman team that defeated the two-time defending national varsity champion in the first game played at Pauley Pavilion. For the next three seasons, Heitz was a 6-foot-3 forward and guard for Coach John Wooden's varsity squad.

President Clinton, stretching his spring vacation for one last day, played out a sports fan's fantasy Monday by attending opening day at Cleveland's new baseball stadium, then flying on to Charlotte, N.C., to see his beloved Arkansas Razorbacks win the NCAA basketball championship, 76-72. Clinton, who makes no pretense of objectivity when it comes to Arkansas basketball, could be seen during the game hooting vigorously and nervously watching the seesaw action.

Shouting "We're No. 1!" amid the crackle of fireworks and the blast of car horns, thousands of people swarmed over the University of Kansas campus in Lawrence, Kan., Monday night in celebration of the Jayhawks winning the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. basketball championship. "It was the best script Danny Manning could have ever written," said Don Robertson, a senior at Kansas. "They were underdogs, they pulled together, and decided they wanted to win and won it all."

When it was really, finally, absolutely over, Danny Manning jumped higher than anyone, which hardly should have been a surprise. He has, after all, done that before. This time, it was different. This time he didn't jump to grab a rebound or to swat away a shot, but in celebration. His Kansas team, which last year hung in suspense while Manning decided whether to turn professional, had won the National Collegiate Athletic Assn.

It was time to talk about the enormity of the event, about the thrill of playing for the national college basketball championship and the specialness of it all. Which is why Harvey Grant leaned over his microphone Sunday to speak to his waiting audience, the cameras rolling and pens poised. "It's no big thrill," Grant deadpanned. There may be a time for seriousness on this Oklahoma team, but it has yet to be seen other than in the ruthlessness the Sooners show on the court.

Here is your TV viewer's guide to things to look for in tonight's NCAA championship game, the Kansas Jayhawks vs. Oklahoma Sooners. Pay attention, because many of these things represent important modern trends in the game. Suits. More bench coaches than you can shake a barbecued spare rib at. It used to be that coaching basketball was a lonely profession. Now it's as lonely as traveling with Martina Navratilova.

After a week of hounding, Louisiana Tech Coach Leon Barmore came to see the media here at the women's Final Four as something akin to an irritating Greek Chorus: Let Us Explain It All For You. The litany went like this: Leon, you and your team are here to avenge a humiliating loss in last years' championship game. Leon, your team is motivated by revenge. Leon, if you don't win this time, people will call you a loser and your players chokers. Barmore has heard it plenty and has liked it less.

The road to Storrs runs through small towns and stretches of wooded countryside where the trees are still mostly bare. On a drizzly afternoon with few cars around, it is hard to imagine that day in 1995 when the people of Connecticut lined this route for miles on end, waving flags, cheering as their college basketball team came home with a championship trophy. Their women's college basketball team. "From the airport all the way to campus," recalled Geno Auriemma, the women's coach at the University of Connecticut.

at St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa, Fla. Stanford (35-3) vs. Tennessee (35-2), 5:30 p.m., PDT, ESPN -- Plenty of attention is being paid to the Candice vs. Candace showdown, but there will be plenty of other talent on the floor. Stanford senior guard Candice Wiggins is averaging 27.4 points in five tournament games, the highest of any player in the tournament. But the second-seeded Cardinal also has one of the better back-to-the-basket post players in center Jayne Appel, who is averaging 20.2 points and 9.8 rebounds in the tournament.

SAN ANTONIO -- The game was over, Memphis had won on a Monday, freshman Derrick Rose was going to be the star and Coach John Calipari was finally going to get his due. Cue the confetti and the CBS theme music. But then it wasn't over. In what will be remembered in Kansas lore as Mario's moon shot, Jayhawks junior guard Mario Chalmers landed a three-point basket with 2.1 seconds left to send a great NCAA championship game into overtime. "I knew it was going in when it left my hand," he said.

SAN ANTONIO -- That's the thing about one shining moment. Somewhere else, there is darkness. Somewhere else, there is chill. After one shining moment carried Kansas to a breathless national championship that will live forever, somewhere else kids were crying. Somewhere else, kids were biting the bottoms of their jerseys, hiding their heads in their towels, throwing punches through the confetti. One shining moment gave Kansas a 75-68 overtime victory in the national title game Monday night.

SAN ANTONIO -- The shot was off-balance, but Mario Chalmers' aim was true. Rock, shock, Jayhawk. It wasn't over, but it might as well have been. Chalmers' desperate three-point basket with 2.1 seconds left in regulation forced Memphis to overtime Monday, and a Kansas team that outlasted some of the best this NCAA tournament had to offer won the national title, 75-68. "It'll probably be the biggest shot ever made in Kansas history," Coach Bill Self said.

TAMPA, Fla. -- Stanford plans to force Tennessee standout Candace Parker to play with her left hand in tonight's NCAA championship game. Up until this point of her college career, everything has always gone right. As in, she could do no wrong, because she can score with either hand, from up close or from outside, and has the awards to prove it. But an injured left shoulder has thrown a curve at the 6-foot-4 redshirt junior and given the Cardinal at least some kind of idea on how to defend her.

Oklahoma forward Dave Sieger was trying to sort out his thoughts after his team was upset by Kansas, 83-79, Monday night in the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. title game at Kemper Arena. "It's like you beat a team and beat a team and then someone says the next one is for the national championship," Sieger said. In other words, the timing wasn't right. Oklahoma beat Kansas twice, 73-65 and 95-87, during the regular season. But those were only Big Eight Conference games.

All is right again in women's basketball. Tennessee, ending a nine-year break between titles, once again rules the collegiate game after rolling to a 59-46 victory over upstart Rutgers on Tuesday night in Quicken Loans Arena to win its seventh NCAA championship. Although Coach Pat Summitt's Lady Vols have reached the Final Four six times in the last nine seasons, Tennessee had not won a national title since 1998, losing to Connecticut in the championship game in 2000, 2003 and 2004.

SAN ANTONIO -- Maybe no one ever wanted to believe Memphis could end up as one of the great teams in NCAA history. The Memphis moons were lunar-eclipsed in this Final Four, engulfed by titans of basketball industry. UCLA, North Carolina and Kansas had combined for 17 national titles to none for the Tigers. "Three blue bloods and a blue collar," Coach John Calipari joked.