Without a national title, this is all for nothing.
This season you have done amazing things. You’ve won 35 games, a SEC regular season title, SEC player of the year awards, and national player of the year awards. You have broken all-time school season block records, conference block records and now national block records. We have multiple all-Americans and numerous future NBA draft picks. This has been a great ride, but don’t you dare take that seatbelt off just yet.
Only 2 teams in the NCAA have beaten you this year. One of them you beat twice already and the other you just sent home yesterday. Every team in the nation fears you even when they say they don’t. With that fear also comes respect, because you play with integrity and class.
The road’s not been easy. You defeated a very tough Iowa State team that wanted to make a name for themselves at your expense. They Failed. Indiana thought for 35 minutes they could beat you. They thought wrong. In each of those wins you showed tremendous focus and intestinal fortitude. This is the moment when you turn it up, that much higher.
Some players are born good. None are born great. It requires sacrifice and determination which you’ve showed all year. The Final 4 is within grasp. The only thing that stands in your way is Baylor.
Baylor is tough, talented, mean, long and young. None of those sound good for you, right? Well that means you have to be tougher, meaner and more focused than them. Baylor and UK have something in common. Both teams will say they aren’t scared and that they’re going to win. The difference is, one of them is lying. You see, when both teams take that court one team believes they can win and the other believes they WILL win. You have to be the aggressor. Don’t let Baylor give you their best shot, you give them YOUR best shot.
This isn’t Indiana, it’s much different. You knew Indiana, their players and their plays. This is a Big 12 team that matches up with you as good as any team in the country. Are you going to let them push you around? Or are you going to be the team that has been there, done that and are going to do again?
Baylor won’t go away quietly. They want some trophies of their own; they’re tired of being the laughing stock of their school. Let’s make sure they get that trophy another year.
Those nets on those rims…they belong to us not Baylor, not any other team. Since those nets belong to us, we determine their fate. They won’t get cut until we have accomplished the task at hand, a National Championship. Let’s go out there and unleash BLUE HELL.
“Number Eight” on 3. 1…2….3…..
