NCAA: Hot Cats, cool Devils, one destination

Yesterday's Final Four National Semifinals could be woven together in several different ways. All of them lead to the same ultimate conclusion: Arizona and Duke are not only the two finalists in this year's NCAA Tournament, they've proven to be the two best teams. Arizona raced to a 20-point second-half lead and held on; Duke stared down a 22-point first-half deficit and came back. Other than that one detail, the Wildcats and Blue Devils reached the Monday night spotlight in ways that closely paralleled each other.

The first similarity between Arizona's and Duke's wins was the ability of each team to devastate their opponent with steals. Arizona's romp in the opening semifinal was obviously attributable to the Wildcats' 15 steals, many of which resulted in breakaway dunks and layups. But lost in the second semi is the fact that Maryland, much like Michigan State, also got killed by turnovers due to an opponent with quicker and more active hands in traffic.

Early on and throughout the game, Maryland had enormous success when Lonny Baxter, Mike Mardesich, Byron Mouton and company quickly caught offensive rebounds and, without putting the ball on the floor, immediately got the ball back on the rim or the backboard. But whenever a Terp put the ball on the floor or could not make a clean catch of a rebound or entry pass, Shane Battier and the rest of the Devils swarmed defensively to create turnovers. This negated Maryland's rebounding edge and enabled the Dukies to complete their comeback.

A second major similarity in the two games revolved around players who had been AWOL, albeit in different ways, and who stepped to the forefront when their teams needed them.

Arizona's absent man was Michael Wright. Wright was a no-show not physically, but mentally. Without a shot against Illinois in the regional finals, Wright stayed invisible in the first half against Michigan State, with another shocking double-bagel: 0 points, 0 rebounds. It was pretty clear that, after an even first half, Wright would need to be a difference maker for the Wildcats.

On the first possession of the second half, just 15 seconds in, Wright was isolated on a set play. He made a clean catch and an authoritative power move to set up an open 8-footer in the middle of the lane, which he nailed. A few plays later, Wright chased down a rebound and scored to give Arizona its first double-digit lead of the game at 41-30. Richard Jefferson and Arizona's backcourt came up with the flurry of steals that sealed the win, but Wright showed up just in time to spur the Cats' decisive 14-0 run at the beginning of the second half.

Duke's missing link against Maryland was Carlos Boozer, who didn't take whole halves off as Wright did, but who was out for a much more normal reason: an injury. The last two times Duke played the Terps, Boozer was not around at the end (and he wasn't around at all for the ACC Tournament Semifinal between the teams), and Maryland, with an even bigger rebounding edge than usual, made decisive runs that beat the Devils in Cameron and nearly beat them in Atlanta.

This time, however, Boozer--who came off the bench for freshman Casey Sanders--was on the court down the stretch, and he was a presence. With Battier and Jason Williams spearheading Duke's gradual but consistent comeback since the 7-minute mark of the first half, Boozer didn't always get a touch when Duke had the ball. But whenever the ball did get cycled down to big #4, Boozer was a bruiser, and he overwhelmed whatever foul-plagued big man Maryland coach Gary Williams put on him.

In a second half where neither team made what could be called a genuine run in the final minutes, it was Boozer who finally extended Duke's leads--to five points (84-79) on a bucket with 2:59 left, and to seven (87-80) on a hoop near the 2-minute mark. Meanwhile, Boozer established himself at the defensive end as Maryland's rotation of big men in support of Baxter--Mardesich, Tahj Holden, Terrence Morris, and Chris Wilcox--all failed to sustain the high-impact effort they had given for the first 35 minutes. Boozer was the only natural low-post player on either team to play well at crunch time. That certainly rates as an X-factor-type performance in a game where someone on Duke had to become a prominent third weapon behind Battier and Williams, who typically carried the load for the Blue Devils.

Parallel number three in the wins fashioned by Arizona and Duke stemmed from the bench limitations of both Michigan State and Maryland. In the first half of each game, the benches for the Spartans and Terps outplayed the first units of the Wildcats and Blue Devils.

Michigan State's Spartan storm troopers featured the freshman 1-2 punch of Zach Randolph (MSU's MVP of the day, considering that he produced when the game was still in doubt; teammate Andre Hutson rang up 20, but most of them when the game was a done deal) and Marcus Taylor, who provided instant offense and energy to keep Tom Izzo's team close in the first half. David Thomas, Mike Chappell and Adam Ballinger all contributed a handful of plays as well to give MSU the balance it would need to keep up with the Cats, whose 1-5 talent in their starting unit is better than Duke's. However, with the exception of Randolph, none of those other bench performers gave anything in the second half. And with Wright and Richard Jefferson stepping up at the offensive end for Arizona, the game became the runaway it was.

The Maryland-Duke game featured a very similar dynamic. Maryland's white-hot start--23-10 at the under-12-minute TV timeout, and 39-17 at the 7-minute mark of the first half--was largely supported by the ability of the Terps' second unit to outplay anyone Mike Krzyzewski had on the floor for Duke. Holden was particularly aggressive in the paint in the early going, and Byron Mouton, along with Drew Nicholas, slashed to the goal and gave the Terps great team rebounding (a la Michigan State) from the wings. And although Mardesich contributed a few baskets midway through the second half to temporarily hold off a Duke comeback, the Maryland bench, along with star shooter Juan Dixon, went silent in the last several minutes. That absence of scoring punch up and down the roster caught up with a Terrapin team that didn't seem nearly as fresh as the Dukies in the game's nitty-gritty moments.

Battier, on the other hand, made it a point to sprint downcourt with his team after a foul, sending a not-so-subtle message about Duke's level of endurance. To be sure, Duke did endure on a night when they didn't make a staggering, lightning-quick run. Gary Williams, from the Maryland bench, didn't use timeouts to stop freight train-level momentum. Coach K's club simply wore down and gradually outplayed Maryland over the long haul. Duke never led until the 6:55 mark of the second half, but the Blue Devils nevertheless outscored the Terps 78-45 in the game's final 27 minutes. Slow and steady won the race for a team that showed it could win with more patience and power than it usually does.

Aside of all the in-game similarities between their two wins, Arizona and Duke will face-off on Monday night because they have the best talent in the game, with coaches who know how to extract that talent from their rosters. Krzyzewski and Lute Olson were both nominated for the Basketball Hall of Fame last week. That's just one more connection between two teams that, in different ways, have shown just how impressive they are: Arizona with an awesome starting five and a lightning-quick knockout punch; Duke with two All-American meal tickets and a Muhammad Ali-like ability to absorb every challenger's biggest flurry. Duke with the steady presence all year; Arizona with the surge after the return of Olson to the bench and the team's survival of turmoil.

In so many ways, it's entirely fitting that Duke and Arizona will play on Monday night for the national championship. One team has lived up to its number one seed throughout the NCAA Tournament, while the other has played like one. After a pair of semifinals that surprisingly ended up with double-digit spreads, expect a devilishly close cat fight in prime time.