A Smile That Says It All

By Mike Wise
Monday, March 27, 2006

He kept nodding, smiling, patting his hands together, exhorting the building on. Lamar Butler, the lithe senior guard with the halogen grin, always dreamt of this, as far as back as childhood when his father was Duke and he was North Carolina and last shot in the back yard won. No do-overs.

But here's the amazing thing: When Butler was scanning the stands for family and friends, it was long before he was snipping the net after the most meaningful, late-round upset in NCAA tournament history. Instead, Butler was beaming as U-Conn. was getting up again, still seven minutes from going down.

The game had so much theater and pulsating moments left, and Butler paid it absolutely no mind. In that moment after a timeout, George Mason's incomparable senior guard was letting the glass-half-empty crowd know it was all right, that the Patriots would be all right. His soft complexion, easily the sweetest and most charming face in college sports today, was awash with an unbridled joy and confidence in the middle of the chaos.

Somehow, he managed to keep a running facial dialogue with the green-and-gold fanatics in the lower bowl and the rafters. In an arena pushing 20,000, Butler was a one-man crisis counselor in the crucible of Mason's miraculous season:

"We got this," he said. "We got this."

Except for Lamar Butler Sr. -- the father he embraced tearfully in a bear hug after the madness had ended, the man who told him, "Don't let anyone ever take your dream away from you" -- who would have believed Lamar Butler Jr.?

See, kids reassure the adults all the time on national television. It takes away the butterflies, the churning of nerves inside. But Butler did this for his father and the rest of that growing Mason Nation, not for himself. Insane as it sounds with future NBA first-rounders trying to end your season, Butler believed before anyone that U-Conn. was going down and Mason -- George "Livin' On A Prayer" Mason! -- was going to Indianapolis.

Maybe this is what overlooked players develop as they grow up in the shadow of big-time college basketball. Maybe when Maryland knocks on your door too late and Georgetown never shows and Virginia is off trying to find an identity outside of the area, you end up with a supreme confidence in yourself and your game.

Butler scored 14 of his 19 points in the second half of the greatest college basketball game most of us will ever see. He knocked down three of the most crucial three-pointers at junctures in which the Patriots desperately needed them.

His team down one with 10 minutes 37 seconds left, he converted the second four-point play of his life, drawing a foul from Mr. Big Shot, U-Conn.'s Rashad Anderson, after he released behind the arc. When Anderson wanted to return the favor late, Butler stuck to him like sock lint.

The roster generously lists Butler at 6 feet 2, 170 pounds, but he probably goes 6-1, 160. Anderson is 6-5, 215 pounds of muscle mass. But Butler was not going to let the most clutch sixth man in college basketball end Mason's majestic ride to the Final Four, the way Anderson shot down Washington to force overtime Friday night.

If there were any Philistine vs. Shepherd metaphors left, this was it -- the kid from Prince George's County shadowing the most dangerous marksman left in the tournament.

"First of all, Rashad Anderson, I was not going to let him catch the ball," Butler said. "I saw what happened the other night. I was face-guarding him; he was not going to get a shot by back-dooring me."

Hours after the final buzzer had sounded, Butler said he thought Cinderella references are misplaced when it came to his team. "I just think we never looked at it like that, that we just believed we had the ability to do this.

"The media labeled us [Cinderella], but we know we're a good team. We have good players who were passed over by bigger schools. I heard I was 'too short for his position.' "

Gary Williams contacted him, but Butler felt it was too late in the game.

"Maryland was my dream school growing up," he said. "Gary Williams talked to my high school coach."

But he ultimately decided, like many of Mason's overlooked kids, "Let me go where I'm wanted and not just be another player on a roster."

So many memorable moments from yesterday. A rough, emotional timeline of Mason's miracle began early, when Liz Larranaga embraced and kissed her husband and said, "You deserve this."

"No, Liz, a lot of coaches deserve this," said Jim, who, in a profession of ruthless climbers, has spent the past 20 years at Bowling Green and George Mason.

"Well let their wives worry about them," she said.

There was Gabe Norwood, whose father Brian, Penn State's secondary coach and brother Justin, the Nittany Lions' leading receiver in the Orange Bowl, came to see him play after Joe Paterno gave the Norwoods the second day of spring practice in Happy Valley off.

There was Carolyn Marsh, the basketball office secretary and an employee of the school since 1976, beside herself like only a behind-the-scenes, seen-and-heard-everything woman could be.

And the most touching of all, the father and son meeting underneath the basket. After the net-cutting ceremony, Lamar Butler Sr. found his son amid the pandemonium.

"Final Four, baby!" he said, as tears streamed down his face and he held his son tightly for about six solid minutes.

"Final Four," Lamar Jr. said.

"I love you and I'm proud of you," the father said, crying.

He had just been named the most outstanding player of the Washington Region, beating out Rudy Gay, perhaps the No. 1 pick in June's NBA draft, and a bunch of big-school ballplayers supposedly more talented and less susceptible to pressure in the final minutes of this scintillating game.

"Just pure joy, indescribable joy," the son said.

"I looked at my father; he was smiling, crying," Butler said. "My mother, they were all crying. It was like a dream come true. I used to dream about that when I was a little kid, in front of my home town, home fans, my family . . . it's indescribable."

A good 30 minutes after he had squared up, fired and his team pulled off nearly the impossible, Butler was still smiling.

Like that grin with seven minutes left, it was neither cocky nor disrespectful. It was knowing and sure. It said, "We got this," when no one believed George Mason did.