In their first-ever trip to the NCAA tournament, the Ospreys were led by Beau Beech’s 28 points. However, Beech — who shares a first name with Beau Bridges, who is the brother of Jeff Bridges, who was The Dude himself — didn’t make a field goal in the last 11 minutes 18 seconds of the game, and he was forced to intentionally miss a free throw with two seconds left, in hopes that his team could corral the rebound and hit a game-tying three-pointer.
It didn’t. Instead, the rebound, and the honor of making a game-sealing free throw, went to the Colonials’ Lucky Jones, who led his team in scoring (21 points) despite coming off the bench. Which would seem to indicate that Robert Morris possessed a surplus of ballers.
That said, if you go back to Driscoll’s comment, he was careful to specify that the ballers-dudes dichotomy applied to events “between the black lines.” Outside of said lines, and up in the stands, North Florida could still lay claim to arguably the greatest baller of the contest: frenetic band member Steven Putnam.
Gotta love that guy. He’ll be missed.