Bob Ford: Calipari-Self rematch fuels NCAA drama

NEW ORLEANS - In a real way, because the matchup on Monday once again places Kansas in the path of his team's try for a national championship, the shadow traced by the arc of Mario Chalmers' three-point shot in 2008 still falls across the career of John Calipari.

The Kentucky coach claims he never watched the tape of that championship game. He doesn't need to review it to forever see Chalmers shoot that fallaway three with just two seconds left and with Derrick Rose in his face. He doesn't need to see the soft ripple of the net as the shot tied the game and forced an overtime in which Kansas would outlast his favored Memphis team.

"That tape was flung out the door of the bus as we were going to the plane," Calipari said. "I have never looked at that tape, nor will I."

By comparison, coach Bill Self of Kansas, the beneficiary of the game-tying shot and the ensuing championship - "I got a new contract; that was one thing" - says he can almost recite that game play by play.

"I'm not a big workout guy, but doing my little elliptical every day, I watched that game every day, [and] I worked out 50 straight days or something like that," Self said. "I could go over a few possessions with you, if you want."

That was then and this is now. Calipari took his mega-recruiting act to Kentucky and Self has kept plugging along at Kansas with a roster that, as Phil Martelli once said of his St. Joseph's teams, "doesn't have McDonald's all-Americans, but has guys who eat at McDonald's."

The story line is a little different this time, but it is still Calipari and Self, and the stakes in the final game are still the same. Kentucky, just like Memphis with Rose, has a player, Anthony Davis, who will almost undoubtedly become the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft. There are another five or six future pros on the Kentucky roster, depending on whose scouting reports you believe. With that talent, the Wildcats are strong favorites against Kansas, but there is no guarantee the tape of Monday's game will make it to the airport, either.

"They probably should [be favored]," Self said. "But I've never known a game to be played on paper."

In the comparison between the 2008 championship and this game between Kentucky and Kansas, it is popular to note that, because of the earlier result, Calipari's career still needs a national title to secure some final validation - or just to avoid the relative ignominy of being remembered like Eddie Sutton or Hugh Durham, as a great, but unlucky, coach.

That's fine, although it ignores the reality that if Chalmers had missed his shot, Calipari would still not have a national championship in the eyes of the NCAA, which expunged that Final Four appearance from the Memphis record book because of some academic chicanery concerning Rose. If that is bad luck, it is the sort that has seemed to follow Calipari through his career.

The other aspect of the comparison between 2008 and 2012 that doesn't wash is the fact that Kansas put five guys in the NBA draft that year. The Jayhawks were loaded. That isn't the case with the current team, and Kansas will have to "muddy up the game," as Self says, with its defense to have a chance against Kentucky. The game will have to be an ugly, bumpy road with lots of stops and starts to keep the Wildcats from reaching the cruising speed they prefer.

"I think early in the season we didn't know if we wanted our identity to be [trying] to outscore people . . . or be a defensive team. We really didn't have an identity, and every good team has to have that," Self said. "We got to the point where there's no question we hang our hat on defending, rebounding, being tough. If we make other teams not play well, then we have a chance to win. It's easier said than done. If Kentucky plays their best, they're going to be hard to beat."

Self was honored as the Naismith college coach of the year on Sunday for doing precisely that sort of thing, figuring out how his team can play its best by the end of the season. The Jayhawks got to the Final Four by beating a very good North Carolina team despite allowing the Tar Heels to shoot 64 percent from the floor in the first half. In the second half, Self went uncharacteristically to a triangle-and-two defense most of the way, and Carolina shot 23 percent and lost by 13 points. That's coaching, right there.

Gimmicks aren't going to beat Kentucky, but things happen in these games. Calipari remembers that much, even if he doesn't still have the videotape to prove it.

"Everything that could have went wrong, went wrong, and everything they had to do right, they did," Calipari said of the 2008 championship game. "The stars and the moon lined up, and all of a sudden we went to overtime."

They are still up there in the sky, in motion and waiting to decide another outcome. Late on Monday night, under a waxing moon and with plenty of Kentucky stars on the court, Calipari will learn whether the alignment turns out better for him this time.