This is Butler, a little school on Sunset Avenue in Indianapolis, Indiana…so says the official university website. To schools who play big-time power basketball like Indiana, North Carolina and Gonzaga, Butler of the Horizon League is anything but little. They are very big on the basketball court as they showed America by winning the Dicks Sporting Goods NIT Tip-Off Tournament by knocking off Gonzaga 79-71 in the tournament finals Friday, Nov. 24, in New York’s Madison Square Garden.
The first two rounds of the tournament for Butler were played in Indianapolis where the Bulldogs got past Notre Dame 71-69 in round one, and Indiana 60-55 in round two last weekend Nov. 13-14. Then a week later the Bulldogs traveled to New York to play the semi-final round Wednesday (Nov. 22) against Bruce Pearls Tennessee Volunteers in Madison Square Garden. The Bulldogs dispatched the Vols 56-44 and had to await the winner of the North Carolina-Gonzaga game in semi-final game-two in what was expected to be the end to a nice beginning. To the surprise of everyone, it was Mark Few’s Gonzaga Bulldogs as the team coming out on top of the No.3 Tar Heels 82-74 setting up Friday’s final round between Butler and Gonzaga.
In championship game, Butler went 23-for-26 from the free throw line, including 16-for-18 over the final 3 ½ minutes, committed seven turnovers and allowed more than 70 points for the first time in the four-game tournament, 42 in the second half. A.J. Graves scored 26 points for Butler (6-0), which won the battle of the Bulldogs despite not making a field goal over the final eight minutes as Gonzaga (5-1) cut an 18 –point deficit to as few as six.
Gonzaga was able to get within seven points five times and six once, 77-71 with 14 seconds left, but Butler kept making free throws.
“We’ll score, we don’t care how we score,” Butler head basketball coach Todd Lickliter said. ”If we score at the line, that’s fine with us. We don’t care. I thought we shot a few threes down the stretch that were a little bit frightening but that’s who we are I guess. They were open. I hate to tell guys who can make them not to shoot them.”
