March Madness: Ranking the Top 10 games of 2019 NCAA Tournament

By Adam Childs | Apr 9, 2019

MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA - APRIL 08: Kyle Guy #5 of the Virginia Cavaliers celebrate his teams 85-77 win over the Texas Tech Red Raiders to win the the 2019 NCAA men's Final Four National Championship game at U.S. Bank Stadium on April 08, 2019 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images) /

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COLUMBIA, SOUTH CAROLINA – MARCH 24: Tacko Fall #24 of the UCF Knights defends against Zion Williamson #1 of the Duke Blue Devils in the second round game of the 2019 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament at Colonial Life Arena on March 24, 2019 in Columbia, South Carolina. (Photo by Streeter Lecka/Getty Images) /

4. Duke 77 – UCF 76

This game featured one of the winningest basketball programs in the country against a team that had just won its first tournament game ever. Duke has the name and they definitely have the star power, including freshman Zion Williamson, RJ Barrett, and Cam Reddish. UCF had a former Dukie roaming the sidelines in Johnny Dawkins and his son Aubrey leading the team. They also had 7’6″ Tacko Fall manning the middle. Few thought that would be enough to topple the mighty Blue Devils but it almost was. And by almost, I mean inches. That is how close the Golden Knights came to the biggest win in school history.

Williamson would lead Duke with 32 points, and none were bigger than they layup he hit to pull the Blue Devils within one with just under 15 seconds left in the game. He would draw the fifth foul on Fall and would head to the line to tie the game. Instead of tying the game, he missed the free throw, but Barrett would grab the offensive rebound (after maybe pushing a UCF guy out of the way and laying in what would be the game-winning basket.

UCF would get their chance and what a chance it would be. BJ Taylor would drive to his right and get a decent shot off, but it came off the rim. Aubrey Dawkins would be there for the tip and it rolled on almost every part of the rim before falling off giving Duke the one-point win. Dawkins tip seemed destined to go into the bottom of the bucket and give the Knights a program-defining win, but it was just not to be. Except for the last tip not falling, Dawkins did everything he could to help the Knights win as he scored 32 points and matched Williamson as the high scorer for the game.

The close loss would be a sign of things to come for the Blue Devils as they could never quite get on track in the tournament. They did escape this one, but not before a big-time scare from a former player’s team. UCF put themselves on the map with this game and just missed a trip to the Sweet 16 for the first time.

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