Mismatch? Heavily Favored Kentucky Plays Syracuse For Ncaa Men’s Championship

With the coronation of Kentucky lacking only a final score and trophy presentation, Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim can only hope to become another notable exception to someone else’s foregone conclusion.

Politics had Truman and Dewey. Football had the Jets and the Colts. Boxing offered Buster Douglas versus Mike Tyson.

“There’s nobody in college basketball that’s unbeatable,” Boeheim contended Sunday. “Everybody knows that. And it’s as simple as that. It’s a one-game deal. It’s not the NBA, it’s not four out of seven. We don’t think we have to play a perfect game.”

Boeheim’s is not the prevailing opinion. Monday night, at the Meadowlands Arena, Kentucky (33-2) and Syracuse (29-8) play for the NCAA championship in a title game that has that lopsided Super Bowl look to it.

Thankfully, there won’t be two weeks to hype the hapless underdog. This execution should be quick and painless.

Kentucky is favored to win its sixth national championship, unleash delirium in the Bluegrass state and, at long last, present coach Rick Pitino with his first championship.

Whatever nit-picking doubts that remained about the Wildcats were resolved with Saturday’s 81-74 victory against No. 1 Massachusetts in the semifinal.

Kentucky has taken on all comers and won in various tempos and style. The Wildcats hammered opponents that dared to run - San Jose, Utah - and withstood the slow-down tactics of Virginia Tech, Wake Forest and UMass.

The presumption here is that a Syracuse victory would rank in NCAA upset lore with North Carolina State’s last-second win against Houston in 1983 and Villanova’s upset against Georgetown in 1985.

“I picked Villanova to win that game,” Boeheim said. “Nobody realized that, because nobody asked me at the time.”

Eleven years later, Syracuse will need a similar script.

In 1985, Villanova shot a singlegame championship record 78.6 percent to deny Georgetown a second consecutive championship.

Boeheim can always dream. In some ways, his team bears resemblance to Jim Valvano’s team of destiny in 1983. North Carolina State had to win the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament to qualify for the NCAA tournament, then barely escaped the opening round, needing two overtimes to defeat Jim Harrick’s Pepperdine team.

No one expected much of Syracuse either. The Orangemen were the fourth-best team in the Big East behind Connecticut, Villanova and Georgetown and by far the least likely to make the Final Four.

Syracuse, like N.C. State, needed some tournament magic. In the West Regional semifinals, Syracuse needed John Wallace’s 3-point basket to claim a thrilling overtime victory against Georgia.

Like Villanova against Georgetown, Syracuse will have to steal this game from Kentucky, a team superior in talent and depth. The Orangemen can only hope the emotions spent against UMass sapped Kentucky of strength and focus.

“Last night’s game was as rough and tough a game as we’ve had all year,” Pitino said of the UMass game. “It was like an Ali-Frazier fight.”

Kentucky is a team with everything to lose; Syracuse a team with everything to gain.

Wallace, the Orangemen’s star forward, is using the underdog role to turn the game into Syracuse vs. the World.

“We’ve been the underdogs a lot of times this season,” he said. “Especially in this tournament. This is just another game.”

Kentucky, conversely, can’t use external vices for motivation. Who doesn’t think the Cats are great? Pressure is nothing new. Kentucky has been favored to win every game. The Wildcats’ most vocal critics have been themselves.

“Right now, we haven’t put two halves together this season,” forward Walter McCarty said. “We haven’t played our best basketball yet.”

The Wildcats know what’s at stake in their hoops-crazed state. It’s the same thing that’s at stake every year. It has been 18 years since Kentucky last won a championship and the natives are getting restless.