Anybody notice how quickly BOTH teams inbounded the ball after a made basket? I have never seen two teams give less of a shit about the opposing team scoring. Great championship game.
Illinois shot 40 3-pointers that game, they set a record for most attempts in championship game history. With that said I think they were fortunate to get 6 FT's.
this had to been the most memorable year ive ever experienced as a tar heel fan. when they won the title after all those years i had to watch em painfully come up short it felt like for 3 months i was walkin on cloud nine! i mean it literally felt like i began to fly when the clock hit 0:00 and we had won!
After going 8-20 in the 2001/02 season, winning it all 4 seasons later just seemed surreal. I remember jamming to Petey Pablo's "North Carolina" the next day. When that song hit the airwaves, I promised to play it when the Tar Heels won a national championship. Oh, how sweet it is.
No LOL. That Illinois team would beat UNC about 8 times out of 10. Illinois shot 12-40 from deep, while UNC shot 9-16. It took an unlucky game from Illinois and a lucky game from UNC, and Illinois was still able to take it down to the last possession.
Steve Guilford, I think your perception of Illinois was inflated because they played in the weak Big Ten. In 2005, UNC dominated Iowa, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan State, and Illinois. I grant that Illinois was better than those other Big Ten teams, but Illinois would not have looked as good if they played in the ACC. UNC was battle-tested by ACC play, and Illinois just couldn't keep up with them.
What I loved most about this win for UNC, was that Jawad Williams, Jackie Manuel, and Melvin Scott got to experience it. These guys suffered through one of the worst seasons in UNC B-ball history in 01,02 when they went 8-20. The last thing you see in this vid is of them with Roy in a huddle, and you know he had to have said something to them about being seniors and how happy he was for them. Those 3 guys were class acts at UNC.
I love the Raymond Felton three, it was way beyond the arch. I loved every min. i have this record on tape. I will purchased this year Championship. I'm proud of my team.
A heavyweight showdown. Other than maybe Kansas/Memphis 2008, the title game hasn't truly felt like THESE ARE THE BEST TEAMS IN THE COUNTRY since this colossal clash.
@tfarrell02-At the 4:50 mark in the 2nd half of this gm, this vid bearly misses it, Packer says, and I quote "The refs aren't calling moving screens on Illinois so they might as well keep doing them"
The reason we had no post player was because the refs literally let May do as he pleased with our players. Poor shooting night and less than 10 minutes from our post man is why Illinois lost. Great game, wish the outcome would have been different, will probably have a repeat of this game for the championship in 2010 or 2011. GO ILLINI!
UI was the people's champion, but UNC won that game. We don't have to argue that, it's pretty apparent that most people would rather have a team that did what Illinois did all season win than to watch UNC get stacked teams and blow people out of the water. We Illinois fans just like to argue this because we know if we hadn't played so poorly we would have been able to win this game.
If you will go back one year before this matchup you'll witness Carolina beating Illinois 88-81 in the ACC - Big 10 challenge in Greensboro. I knew Carolina would beat em again. The better team win, simple as that.
As dominant as Sean May was in this game, the 3-point shot by Raymond Felton when it was 65-65 was the biggest moment in this game. Illinois looked like they were going to pull back ahead after making a great 2nd half run, but then Felton drains that 3 over Deron and Dee. It was an absolutely incredibly and timely shot the Tar Heels needed.
Illinois had an AWESOME team that year! They were really really good, and was almost evenly matched in regards to talent. My Tar Heels had a "slight" edge with Sean May, who was a beast in the paint. But Illinois was definitely "for real". And yeah, the Illini beat UNC the following year, but not when it counted - in the NATIONAL TITLE GAME. Plus, we unloaded our top-7 scorers to the NBA and graduation. It's all good though...THE CAROLINA SHOW ROLLED ON!!!
no, because im a kansas fan and roy was our old coach and it pissed me off that he never won us a title but 6 yrs at unc and he gets 2 titles thats all. but now im glad we have bill self so all is well.
Augie picked the wrong day to have the worst game of his entire life. He was tight going into this game. The whole team was. I could see it in their body language. And Luther made a boneheaded play at the end he hadn't made all year long. UNC was so damned tough. Just relentless. May absolutely willed them to victory.
@spm1021- and Illinois is the only team in championship history to get away with about 6 (if not more) moving screens that got them back into the game the second half.
I'd have to say I pretty much entirely agree with u. Finally a ILL fan that actually don't cry and moan and talks sense. THANK YOU!!! LOL but yea, these were two great teams no doubt. I'm a UNC fan living in ILL
You guys can argue all you want, but the 2005 Championship game was awesome and you know it. The 2004-2005 Illini TEAM was awesome. If I were you, I would keep your eyes on Derron Williams. NC coach knows that... ask him. And I would not count Felton out neither.
hey man don't forget that the Illini were supposed to have Villanueva that year but he backed out and went to UConn. I'm positive that if Villanueva was playing, things would have turned out a lot differently
everybody love raymond i cant believe he said dee brown was faster then raymond with the ball in his hands r u crazy man !!raymond was the best PG that year
UNC was by far the best team in the country this year. When you look at the rotation that we had there was not enough talent on the Illini team to beat UNC. When you have Offensive players that can play D also and then you have 3 or 4 coming off the bench to play, not enough energy to come from 5 or 6 capable players to over come a 8 or 9 man rotation.
As a Midwesterner in the middle of Big 10 Country, I wanted Illinois to win badly. However I got a bad feeling right from the start when I saw Illinois wearing their road orange jerseys instead of their home white ones. Illinois was the higher ranked team and should have wore their home uniforms while North Carolina wore their road blue uniforms.
To everyone who is saying about the game getting stolen from the Illinois and that they didn't commit any moving screens.. the announcers even mentioned the moving screens.. get over it. The better team won.
Very true,Honestly I'd rather have my players win a national championship, than be all stars in the NBA. I care more about college hoops than pro, and so do most people
A) those aren't my words, they came from another post. B) The people's champion doesn't mean people thought they were the champion, it means people favored them and wanted them to win it.
@dlstewart1- Much respect for being in Iraq!! And May was drafted by the Bobcats with Felton but was hurt pretty much evry year and rele didn't amount to anything, the last time i remember seeing him on a NBA bench was like 2009, idk where he is now. Marvin Williams has actually become a vry solid plyr for Atlanta, and Jawad Williams has been a reserve and bench plyr for the Cleveland Cavaliers for the last two yrs. Idk bout anybody else though
Bottomline, the game featured many future NBA and professional basketball players. Illinois lacked size; however, their guards were better. The best player to come out of the game was Deron Williams. North Carolina has no one even close to his talent today. Goes to show that basketball is a team game.
that was the problem with this game, the NCAA tournament is turning into a popularity contest, especially in "underdog" games. I know Illinois was a 1 seed but it was their first year being great.
@tarheels2005champs I agree our post were ridiculouly soft and Sean May was way too strong for them. But living by the three is what got us 37 wins that year.
@down1plus2- I didn't mean Felton, i ment May didn't amount to anyting. I looked at how i wrote it and yea it sounded like that. But i ment May was drafted to the Bobcats with Felton, and MAY didn't amount to anything in the NBA lol. I know Felton is good, he cudda been an All Star this year and is puttin up decent #s still for DEN
how about jordan, james worthy, vince carter, antawn jamison how are they doing in the nba? not to mention jerry stackhouse when he was young, and rasheed wallace. how are you doing in the nba?
Sean May is un-signed I belive, Rashaad McCants is a bench plyr on Minnesota, Raymond Felton is the starting PG on the Bobcats, Jawad Williams is a reserve on the Cavaliers, and the only one doing good is Marvin Williams who is a budding star on the ATL Hawks
