March Madness. The time of the year when anything can happen and any team can surpass expectations. As the month of April is now here, the 2021 NCAA men’s basketball tournament is winding down and nearing completion. What started as sixty-eight teams has now been narrowed to only two remaining teams. Monday and Tuesday of last week were the Elite Eight and Saturday of last week was the Final Four.
This year, in the Elite Eight the number 2 seed Houston Cougars beat the number 12 seed Oregon State Beavers by a score of 67-61, the number one seed Baylor Bears beat the number 3 seed Arkansas Razorbacks by a score of 81-72, number one seed Gonzaga Bulldogs beat the number 6 seed University of Southern California Trojans by a score of 85-66 and the number eleven seed University of Southern California Los Angeles (UCLA) Bruins beat the Michigan Wolverines by a score of 51-59.
The Final Four consisted of two number one seeds, one number two seed and one number eleven seed. In the first game of the Final Four, the number one seed Baylor Bears beat the number two seed Houston Cougars by a score of 78-59. In the second game of the Final Four, the number one seed Gonzaga Bulldogs beat the number eleven seed UCLA Bruins by a score of 93-90.
Now that the Final Four matchups have been played, there is now only one game left in the 2020-2021 NCAA basketball season. Two number one seeds will be playing each other in the final game. Baylor, from the Big 12, who had a regular-season record of 21-1, will be playing Gonzaga, the West Coast Conference champions who had a regular-season record of 24-0. While Baylor and Gonzaga were scheduled to play each other earlier in the season, due to that game being canceled the championship game on Monday night will be the first time that these two teams have played each other this season.
Getting to the championship game was a bit of an opposite for these two teams. Gonzaga had a perfect regular season and won their conference championship. Baylor did not have a perfect regular season and did not make it to the final round of their conference championships. Baylor has an easy win over Houston to make it into the NCAA championship game. Gonzaga had to go into overtime and beat UCLA on a last-second nearly half-court shot to make it into the NCAA championship game. However, despite these two different paths to make it to the final game of the season, these two teams will be playing each other for the top position in all of NCAA men’s basketball.
Two teams will play in the game, but only one can win. Find out who takes home the championship on Monday night when a champion will be crowned. The final game of the 2020-2021 NCAA men’s basketball season will begin at 7:20 pm CT on Monday, April 5, 2021 and will be televised on CBS.
