Jim Larrañaga Touted as HOFer After Miami Rallies Past Texas to Reach Final Four
Miami is headed to the Final Four of the NCAA men's basketball tournament for the first time in program history.
The fifth-seeded Hurricanes defeated the second-seeded Texas Longhorns 88-81 in Sunday's Elite Eight contest to determine the champion of the Midwest Region. They earned a matchup with UConn in the Final Four and are now just two victories away from cutting down the nets as national champions for the first time ever.
It looked as if Texas was going to cruise to a win for much of the contest, but Miami dominated crunch time to completely flip the script. All five starters scored in double figures, with Jordan Miller leading the way in a perfect shooting performance at 27 points on 7-of-7 from the field and 13-of-13 from the free-throw line.
The win means Jim Larrañaga's rebuilding process is complete, and the head coach drew plenty of praise on social media:
Sunday's first Elite Eight game was defined by defense as San Diego State defeated Creighton, but Texas offense had different ideas when it took the court. The Longhorns set the tone on that end of the floor while pouring in 45 first-half points to jump out to a quick lead.
The bench combination of Brock Cunningham, Arterio Morris and Sir'Jabari Rice provided an important spark with forward Dylan Disu sidelined because of a foot injury, while Timmy Allen and Marcus Carr spearheaded the efforts for the starters.
Texas extended the lead to double digits in the second half and seemed to be in full control with Carr facilitating and Allen attacking the lane, but Miami's balanced attack and ability to force turnovers allowed it to come storming back even though it wasn't relying on three-point shooting.
An and-1 from Norchad Omier gave the ACC representatives the lead in the final six minutes and set the stage for the back-and-forth finish.
That stage was dominated by Hurricane free throws, as their final 13 points came from the charity stripe. While that will leave a bad taste in Texas' mouth as a result, it was also a testament to the clutch shooting of Miller in particular with the game on the line.
If that continues, UConn could be in trouble.
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