If you haven't used your monthly "Free Article" on The Athletic yet, this one is worth it:

https://theathletic.com/1671049/2020/03 ... l-history/

Its a quick oral history/deep dive on Sam's shot to win the conference tournament. Here are some highlights:

Smith: We practice late-game situations on a regular basis, so there was never a doubt. To be honest, I wouldn’t call it a dream, but I had more of a premonition that morning of the game, just getting ready for the game, I just had a strong inclination that it was going to come down to the very end of the game. You can never predict it. I just had a premonition. We’re not an iso team at all. When I first got hired, not even two years ago, over the summer we put in a lot of iso sets for Sam. I’m not an iso coach. That’s just not my deal. We’re No. 10 in assists this year, last year we were No. 5 in the country in assists, we really move the ball, share the ball as an offense. We put in a couple iso sets for Sam a couple years ago and Sam kind of looked at me, ‘Iso ball is not really my deal,’ and I said, ‘Yeah, I can tell.’

Garrard: After the Colorado State game, he’d mentioned to me that he’d hit that shot a thousand times in practice. Where he dribbles outside the 3-point line, where he rises, fires and hits the shot. It’s something that he knew he could do with a high level of regularity. So when he’s hesitating outside that 3-point line with about five or six seconds left, I knew for sure he was going to rise for a 3. Normally, he’d been going kind of straight away. He worked a little bit more left than normal and a little bit had to do with Feagin and so Feagin forced him a little bit left. To see him rise up was not a surprise at all.

Merrill: I just feel like I’ve been in a lot of situations where … I’m not a big celebratory guy. So I hate when guys celebrate early and then something happens. For me, it was all like, we need to get just one stop and then celebrate as much as we want. I wish there would’ve been less time, so I could have celebrated, but I was just like thinking, ‘Thank goodness Jalen Moore’s not on the floor.’

Merrill had a front-row seat for a half-court heave from the right side of the floor seven years ago. His eventually USU teammate, former forward Jalen Moore, hit a half-court buzzer-beater in the Utah Class 4A semifinals in 2013. Merrill was guarding Moore.

Here is the clip of Jalen's buzzer beater with Sam guarding him. Eerily similar to the shot Flynn got off at the buzzer last Saturday.



And of course, a clip of "The Shot" courtesy of GameFAQs:

Floppy Hat wrote:Here is the clip of Jalen's buzzer beater with Sam guarding him. Eerily similar to the shot Flynn got off at the buzzer last Saturday.



And of course, a clip of "The Shot" courtesy of GameFAQs:

I could watch Sam’s shot all day.


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2004AG wrote: ↑

March 12th, 2020, 9:00 am

I could watch Sam’s shot all day.

Same here. Man, it's just so great. And the excerpts above from that article are awesome.

I don't read the Athletic, but it's not giving me a free article. Thoughts, anyone?

That shot may end up being Sam's final college basket. Disappointing he may not get to play in the NCAA tourney, but wow, what a way to go out.

It was interesting that Moore's shot was just about the spot where Flynn shot his.

Aggiebull wrote: ↑

March 12th, 2020, 1:34 pm

It was interesting that Moore's shot was just about the spot where Flynn shot his.

But Moore made his.

Moore > Flynn

Facts are facts.