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There was one final prayer for Purdue Boilermakers but, let’s be honest: the invaders from the Big Ten weren’t about to receive any celestial intervention. Not this night. Not this game. Not against the Saint Peter’s Peacocks.
Not on National Peacock Day.
(Is that really a thing? On this night, anyway, it was really a thing.)
No. Jaden Ivey’s shot from about 10 feet beyond the top of the key might’ve looked good on TV. It might’ve looked good to certain segments of Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, especially since it wasn’t just Saint Peter’s diehards who were on their feet, trying to shout the ball wide, or short, but also the folks in the building wearing UCLA and North Carolina gear.
(And it wasn’t just because all shades of blue stick together.)
It never had a shot. It bounded harmlessly away. The buzzer groaned and the roar inside Wells Fargo Center rose. It was over. It was done. The magical mystery tour for Saint Peters’ would last at least another two days. The evidence overhead, frozen on the scoreboard, will stand forever.
Saint Peter’s 67, Purdue 64.
Peacocks 67, Boilermakers 64.
(HAPPY NATIONAL PEACOCK DAY!)
“We’re happy,” Saint Peter’s guard Doug Edert said, “but we’re not satisfied.”
“We’re as good as any team in the country,” guard Matthew Lee said.
Are you going to tell them they’re wrong, that they’re delusional, that they’re detached from reality? After what they’ve done since March 17? After what they’ve done going back to the MAAC tournament, or going back to Feb. 20, when they lost at Siena, 84-71, dropping their record to 12-11?
Well, they’re 10-0 since. They stunned Kentucky and ruined probably 50 percent of the brackets in existence. They dominated Murray State, which was supposed to be the gold standard of mid-majors this year. And Friday night it was Purdue, which spent some time this year as the No. 1 team in the country.
(A reign that ended when New Jersey’s OTHER team, Rutgers, beat the Boilermakers back in December. Some people hate New Jersey for kicks; Purdue’s angry fans have some legit stuff to grumble about.)
“What,” a gleeful Shaheen Holloway said, “are they gonna say next?”
Holloway, the Peacocks’ coach, said this with a wink. He knows 95 percent of the building was on his side Friday night, as was 95 percent of America. He knows people love the underdog in March, so it isn’t as if anyone is lined up against the Peacocks.
But he also knows that much of the emotion tied up in his team is because they are the cute story, the little-engine-that-could story, the first team from the MAAC to advance as far as the Elite Eight, the first No. 15 seed to advance that far. People love to root for a team like Saint Peter’s, but it’s something else to believe in a team like the Peacocks. Much as you might want to.
And Holloway knows that without belief, the Peacocks probably wouldn’t have made it past Quinnipiac in the MAAC semifinals, let alone through the gauntlet they’ve already negotiated.
“We trust each other,” the coach said. “And it’s beautiful to see.”
It is. It really is. And the thing is, the way these games have gone? More and more people are truly starting to believe in the Peacocks, and not simply to be charmed by them. They haven’t won on any crazy last-second trick shots. They had to beat Kentucky in overtime. Murray State never came close to rattling them. Purdue led them after the game’s final TV timeout Friday. It didn’t matter.
“We keep getting in these situations,” Lee said, “and we keep prevailing.”
“We feel like we belong,” Edert said.
Belong? It’s their tournament now. It’s their season. Wells Fargo will be their home court Sunday, a Pennsylvania annex of Jersey City’s Run Baby Run Arena. They aren’t a cute story. They aren’t Cinderella, not after three wins in the tournament, and 10 straight going back to February. Belong? Please. They should rename the whole bracket the Saint Peter’s Invitational at this point. Would you mind? Would anybody?
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