When March rolls around, every basketball fan in the country focuses their attention to one thing, NCAA March Madness. This event promises buzzer beaters, passion, heartbreak, and last but not least, the upsets.
Every year you have a select team or a couple of teams that ruin everyone’s bracket by going farther than anyone ever thought. These teams are known as Cinderellas due to them having a happy ending to a dance despite their situation. It seems to happen at least once a year and always feature a player who ends up putting their name on the map.
There has only been two times in the history of college basketball where a 16 seed has beat a one seed, UMBC beating Virginia in 2018 and Fairleigh Dickinson beating Perdue in 2023. However, one team from upstate New York got really close to possibly the biggest tournament upset in college basketball history.
On March 19th, the 16th seed Siena Saints faced the number 1 ranked Duke Blue Devils, who many have winning the whole tournament. The Saints came in as an underdog, a team that many believed would not even have a chance at keeping this game within 20 points, but Siena proved just about everyone wrong. Siena would come out of the gates gunning and ending the game with an impressive 35 percent from the three-point line. They led at halftime by 11 points, 43 to 32 despite all of the hate and little confidence that people had in them. This boosted the odds of Siena winning this game from 0.8 percent to 34.5 percent according to ESPN.
However, Duke cannot be counted out. They came out in the second half with fire in their eyes, looking for revenge. Cameron and Cayden Boozer showed their twin connection in a perfect way, Cam using his size and asserting his dominance in the paint as he did all year, he would lead all scorers with 22 points. Cayden would end with five assists and an impressive zero turnovers. The Blue Devils would blow out this half, outscoring the Saints 39 to 22.
The Saints would only end up losing this game by six points despite their potential to lose by over 20. “It made me upset, it would of been insane to see them win that game,” said Cortland student and basketball fan, Ryan Johnson. Even though they lost, the Saints showed the country what they are made of. This opened up plenty of opportunities for Siena players and their coach, Gerry McNamara.
McNamara just signed a contract with his alma mater, Syracuse University as their new basketball coach. Gerry was the starting point guard on a national championship with the orange back in 2003 alongside Carmelo Anthony where they would beat the Kansas Jayhawks, 81 to 78.
Francis Folefac would score a total of 18 points to go along with seven rebounds for the Saints despite being guarded by the bigger sized, Cameron Boozer. But the player that showed out the most for the Saints was sophomore Gavin Doty from Fulton, New York. He would end the game with 21 points and shoot a perfect four for four from the free-throw line and will most likely follow Coach McNamara to Syracuse next year with him entering the transfer portal.
Despite the loss, the Siena Saints put themselves on the map and created future success for many of their players. It leaves everyone questioning what the future has to leave for these players and how much potential they truly hold.