The Final Four teams are in San Antonio. What do they have that Kentucky lacked?
Auburn, Duke, Florida and Houston are here along the River Walk for college basketball’s 2025 Final Four, which begins Saturday and finishes Monday. Kentucky is not here, of course. New coach Mark Pope engineered an impressive first season from scratch to reach the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16, but landed two wins short of its San Antonio goal.
So what do these Final Four teams possess that Kentucky lacked?
Florida added a layer of toughness Much like Pope, Gators coach Todd Golden is an analytics disciple. Unlike Pope, the 39-year-old Golden has had three years to instill his approach upon the program. During his Thursday press conference at the Alamodome, Golden pointed to a key moment when over an Easter weekend he convinced Iona transfer Walter Clayton to become a Gator instead of following Rick Pitino to St. John’s.
“One of the benefits of being Jewish,” said Golden, “is that we don’t celebrate Easter.” After losing in the first round of last year’s NCAA, “we left like we needed an added layer of toughness.” Enter FAU transfer Alijah Martin, Washington State transfer Rueben Chinyelu and Chattanooga transfer Sam Alexis. “They kind of rounded things out,” Golden said.
Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl’s
Auburn boasts institutional knowledge
As relayed by Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl, Auburn center Dylan Cardwell put it best: “This is our last free breakfast.” Kentucky put an older team on the floor, but Auburn is oldest. Pearl has nine seniors on his roster. Six of its top seven scorers are seniors. Five of the six are seniors who have been in the program for at least two seasons
And not every team has a senior named Johni Broome. After two seasons at Morehead State, Broome has made his third season in Pearl’s program his best. Broome is averaging 18.7 points, 10.9 rebounds and 2.9 assists for the tournament’s overall No. 1 seed. If every Final Four team needs a go-to player, Broome is that for the Tigers. Broome excelled through nagging ankle and shoulder injuries. He then injured his elbow in Auburn’s 70-64 win over Michigan State in the South Regional finals. The go-to guy said he will be good to go on Saturday
Houston head coach Kelvin Sampson’s
Houston has established a coveted culture
Where as Kentucky ranks 52nd in kenpom’s adjusted defensive efficiency rankings, Houston ranks No. 1. Where as Kentucky allowed Tennessee to shoot 50.9 percent from the floor in its 78-65 loss to the Vols in the Midwest Regional semifinals last week in Indianapolis, Houston held the Vols to 28.8 percent shooting in its 69-50 regional finals win.
Kelvin Sampson’s defensive stamp didn’t happen overnight. Houston ranked 184, 179 and 79 in kenpom’s defensive efficiency his first three seasons as the Cougars’ coach. Houston has ranked no worse than 21st the eight seasons since. It has been in the top 10 defensively each of the past five seasons. In fact, when Jon Scheyer succeeded the legendary Mike Krzyzewski at Duke in 2022, the first thing Scheyer did was reach out to Sampson for a preseason scrimmage with Houston
Duke beat Houston 54-51 in a regional semifinal last season, but how did that first scrimmage go? “We got punched in the face,” Scheyer said. “But we punched back, too.”
Duke felt like ‘we had a special class’ Current conventional wisdom states teams built on freshmen can no longer win the national championship. But what if you have ultra-talented freshmen? Or the ultra-talented freshman? And what if you surround that talent with ultra-effective support?
“There’s a part of you that feels like you’re a little crazy,” said Scheyer on Thursday when asked about his freshmen-oriented team compared to the current trend in roster construction. “But we felt like we had special class you can’t have every year.” There is death, taxes and Cooper Flagg as the No. 1 selection in this year’s NBA draft. Fellow Blue Devils rookie starters Kon Knueppel and Khaman Maluach are not chopped liver. And the Duke that lost 77-72 to Kentucky in the Champions Classic in November is not the turbocharged Duke we have seen in this tournament.
The Blue Devils have shot at least 50 percent from the field in all four of their games. They shot 64.4 percent against Baylor, 60 percent against Arizona. They have made 43 of 91 shots from 3-point range for 47.3 percent. They are an offensive machine. “The brilliance with Jon is how he has insulated those guys with veteran guys,” Sampson said Thursday. “We know all about Sion James. This is the third year we’ve seen (Tyrese) Proctor. Proctor’s a pro. I think you can get away with playing freshmen if you have some veterans around them.”
To be sure, Flagg is the flagship of the fleet, but his NCAA numbers are not spectacular. He did score 30 points vs. Arizona, but averaged 16 points and eight rebounds in Duke’s other three games. The Blue Devils’ success proves Sampson’s point.
