HOUSTON — The 74,000-plus packed inside NRG Stadium were stunned, divided by silence and screams. The nation was the same, elated or deflated.
Only Kris Jenkins could believe what had occurred. Only he acted like the ending was obvious, confidently and defiantly standing with his hands in the air, having made what immediately could be considered the greatest shot the sport has ever seen.
“I knew it was going in,” the Villanova junior said after hitting the buzzer-beating 3-pointer that improbably clinched Monday’s national championship win over North Carolina.
The 31-year wait at Villanova hadn’t just ended, but instantly exploded, sending the team sprinting to swarm their teammate who had just become 22 forever.
Jenkins had never been hugged so hard by so many, and never been loved so much by so many he never had met.
After running off the court to hug his mom, Felicia, Jenkins rejoined his teammates to watch his shot for the first time on the stadium’s big screen, a replay assured of rivaling Christian Laettner’s every March.
Minutes earlier, Felicia looked like Jim Valvano in 1983, just looking for someone amidst the chaos.
“I don’t know what just happened,” she said to no one in particular. “Did that really just happen?”
Another day wasn’t going to make it feel any more real. Even years don’t always steal the shock.
More than three decades later, it still seems preposterous the Wildcats could upset Patrick Ewing and Georgetown. It still leans closer to fiction that North Carolina State could beat Phi Slama Jama.
This moment was to belong to Marcus Paige. The Tar Heels senior was supposed to be Jenkins, a legend who would survive long after his life was over, like the late Lorenzo Charles.
With his game-tying 3-pointer with 4.7 seconds left, Paige had become Mario Chalmers. He was Keith Smart. He was Michael Jordan.
But sometimes, someone like Charles soars into the air and snatches immortality. Sometimes, someone like Jenkins screams for the ball and releases a shot so pure and so perfect that the swish sound can still be heard after the net is cut down.
“It was like in slow motion,” Villanova’s Daniel Ochefu said. “I was lost. I walked around in a circle for about five minutes.”
Another 10 or 60 or 525,600 minutes would not have made it more believable because shots like that belong in your head. They are the dreams of children, a fantasy no college-aged player would confuse with reality.
Only N.C. State had ever won the national title with no time left on the clock.
Jenkins wasn’t supposed to know that feeling. He was the inbounder on the final play, an option coach Jay Wright ranked closer to the bottom then the top of his five players on the court.
Jenkins was probably headed to overtime, like everyone else, likely headed for the anonymity even those fortunate enough to play in the Final Four eventually receive.
But Jenkins knew that would change when he released the ball. He knew before anyone else.
“Kris Jenkins lives for that moment,” Wright said.
Now, Jenkins lives forever because of that moment.