MINNEAPOLIS — So that’s what all the hype was about?
Through 5 ¹/₂ NCAA Tournament games, De’Andre Hunter had been mostly potential, little production. His shot was off. His aggressiveness was lacking. The tools were there, but the results weren’t.
That changed at halftime of Monday’s national championship game, and his metamorphosis carried the top-seeded Cavaliers to their ever title, 85-77, over No. 3 Texas Tech at U.S. Bank Stadium. The 6-foot-7 Hunter scored 22 of his career-high 27 points over the game’s final 25 minutes and hit the game’s two biggest shots — a 3-pointer with 12.1 seconds in regulation to force overtime, and another 3-pointer to give Virginia the lead for good in the extra session.
“That tells you there’s something in that young man,” Virginia coach Tony Bennett said. “He’s got more — he’s scratching the surface.”
Just as impressively, Hunter shut down Texas Tech star sophomore Jarrett Culver, limiting him to 15 points on 5-of-22 shooting. In a matchup of two projected top-10 draft picks, Hunter won by a landslide.
“’Dre made him work to get shots,” Bennett said. “His ability to lock in and slide is as good as most, and I thought it was a great two-way performance, defensively and offensively, in this game and this setting. He saved his best for last.”
Hunter didn’t have quite the same motivation as his teammates. He didn’t play in the history-making defeat last March, when Virginia became the first No. 1 seed ever to lose to a No. 16.
Had he not broken his wrist, perhaps the Cavaliers would not have lost that game. But, maybe they don’t respond like they did Monday night either, by winning it all.
“We embraced it. We didn’t run away from it,” Hunter said. “Our coaches told us, we were going to face adversity all year. We just embraced all those questions.”
And they became national champions, led by Hunter making sure their tears were those of joy this year after all the anguish.
“I’ll remember [this moment] for the rest of my life,” he said.