Holy Cross Is Exactly Why We Love March Madness

Holy Cross did it! On Wednesday night the Crusaders topped Southern 59-55 for their first NCAA Tournament win since 1953. The Patriot League’s ninth-place team is moving on to play No. 1 seed Oregon on Friday in Spokane. The fact the Crusaders are still dancing is just one of the reasons we all love March Madness so much.

Holy Cross went 5-13 in the Patriot League this season and finished ahead of only Lafayette (3-15) in the conference’s standings. The Crusaders also entered the conference tournament having lost their final five regular season games, and were 4-12 over their last 16 contests.

Somehow, as the ninth-seed in the conference tournament, Holy Cross topped eighth-seeded Loyola (72-67), top-seeded Bucknell (77-72 in two overtimes), fourth-seeded Army (60-38) and second-seeded Lehigh (59-56). The team won four games in nine days after finishing the regular season with an overall record of 10-19.

With Wednesday’s play-in game victory over Southern, The Crusaders have now won five games in a row, their longest win streak of the season by two games. Their RPI entering Wednesday night’s game was 248 out of 347, while Southern’s was 186. It should have been a blowout, but things rarely go to plan in March, especially when this Holy Cross squad is involved.

While plenty of people think the NCAA’s reliance on conference tournaments to pick the automatic bids to the Big Dance is unfair to teams that dominate the regular season, Holy Cross’ run stands as an example of all that’s right with the system. It has been so much fun watching this team over the past two-plus weeks.

The roster finally seems to be figuring things out and learning how to play together. A mix of upperclassmen and freshmen are the main contributors to a team peaking at the right time. Juniors Malachi Alexander, Robert Champion (great name), Matt Husek and Anthony Thompson, and seniors Cullen Hamilton and Eric Green have  meshed with freshmen Karl Charles (another great name) and Matt Zignorski to bring this Cinderella story to life.

Champion was the hero Wednesday night, pouring in 19 points while hitting 6-of-8 shots from the field and 3-of-5 from beyond the arc. One of those 3-pointers was a dagger with 52 seconds left to give the Crusaders the lead. They never relinquished it.

Holy Cross was 0-9 in the NCAA Tournament since it beat Navy and Wake Forest in 1953. The school actually took home the national title in 1947, but hasn’t exactly been a basketball powerhouse since. But this year’s team has made a different kind of headlines and become a national story in the process. They are the perfect example of what this time of year is all about.

Can the Crusaders beat Oregon on Friday? Almost assuredly not, but they get the chance to do it and prove us all wrong once again. Given what they’ve accomplished over the last few weeks, they have certainly earned that shot.