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SAN ANTONIO (AP) — J'Wan Roberts has been at Houston for six seasons and played in 149 wins for the Cougars.
Win one more time in his final game Monday night against Florida, and the Cougars will be first-time national champions.
“It feels great. I can say I've been to the tournament every year since I've been in college, and we've always gotten close, but we always lost," Roberts said Sunday, the day before the 6-foot-8 forward puts on a Cougars jersey for the 173rd time. “So for us to actually get to the national championship, and won like the way we did last night, is kind of crazy.”
The Cougars (35-4) overcame a 14-point deficit in the final eight minutes to stun Duke 70-67 in the national semifinal Saturday night. Roberts, a 63% free-throw shooter, calmly made two with 19 seconds left to put them ahead to stay and then defended a final shot by Cooper Flagg, the 6-9 freshman sensation and AP national player of the year.
Roberts went to the line after Flagg was called for a foul with both big men going after a rebound of a missed free throw by Duke. Several times before and after shooting his free throws, Roberts motioned for quiet from the ecstatic Cougars fans in the crowd of 68,522 in the Alamodome.
“I was trying to calm everybody else down, it was getting a little too loud, because I still had to make another free throw," he said. “So everybody’s going berserk like I had just won a game with 0.1 on the clock.”
Well, they were really in a frenzy when Duke came out of a timeout and Flagg missed a fadeaway shot contested perfectly by Roberts as he extended his long arms.
When the game finally ended, Roberts tugged up the top of his No. 13 jersey with both hands to prominently display the Cougars name on the front as he hollered and interacted with the nearby red-clad fans. He was already celebrating with them when L.J. Cryer was adding two more free throws for the final margin.
Houston, which has an 18-game winning streak while winning 30 of 31, is in its first national championship game since back-to-back appearances in 1983 and 1984 during the Phi Slama Jama era with Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler.
It is Roberts who is the winningest player in Houston history, though he did benefit from an extra year on the court. After redshirting in 2019-20, he got to play the next five seasons because of the extra year of eligibility the NCAA granted players who were in school during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“He’s been here as long as anybody. He knows the ins and outs of this program. Knows what it takes to win. ... He’s really just the ultimate Cougar, and he’s the epitome of Houston basketball,” junior guard Emanuel Sharp said.
Roberts is the only holdover from Houston's 2021 Final Four team that lost in the national semifinal to eventual champion Baylor. The Cougars made another regional final the following season and went to two more Sweet 16s before this year.
“Being here six years is crazy. I don’t know how he’s done it because it’s a lot of grueling days when you’re playing for Houston, especially for practices,” said Cryer, their second-year transfer and leading scorer who was a freshman on Baylor's 2021 title team. “For him to stick it out here shows how much he really loves this program and the love he has for the brothers. We’re going to go out here and try to get him a ring so he can end his career off on the right note.”
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