The No. 1 Duke Blue Devils led the No. 2 UConn Huskies by 15 points at halftime of their men’s NCAA Tournament Elite Eight battle on Sunday. The Huskies staged a furious comeback of historic proportions: Prior to today, No. 1 seeds had been 134-0 when leading by 15-plus points at halftime.
Now, they’re 134-1.
UConn trailed by as many as 19 points in the first half, but hung around in the second half, and Tarris Reed Jr. brought it within 67-62 with just over four minutes remaining. A lot was going on, so you might not have noticed legendary actor Bill Murray going wild in the crowd after Reed Jr.’s layup.
Mayhem only escalated from there.
Duke’s Cayden Boozer committed a surprising turnover with six seconds left to give UConn’s Braylon Mullins a shot at UConn immortality. Mullins drilled a logo 3 with 0.3 seconds left to win 73-72 and send UConn to the Final Four.
Luke Murray, Bill’s son, has been an assistant coach on Dan Hurley’s UConn staff since 2021. The Huskies won back-to-back national championships in 2023 and 2024.
Murray will depart UConn to become the head coach at Boston College after the season.
UConn’s NCAA Tournament run has resurfaced an old clip of Murray discussing watching his son succeed as a basketball coach with Alexa Datt around 2014.
In it, the Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning actor said, “He can pay his own bills and everything. That’s really exciting. But he’s good at what he does. He’s pretty good at what he does. I get a kick out of it. And he wears a tie! Who wouldn’t be proud of his son in a tie?”
will face No. 3 Illinois in the Final Four on Saturday, April 4, at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
