“Nobody thinks I have a tough job, so I’m not going to talk about a tough job,” he said. “My job being tough? We’ve been the leader of the pack for about 25 years, so we get everyone’s best shot. That’s the toughest thing. Our guys need to be ready for that each time. So it’s getting kids to understand that. They don’t get that in high school. They hardly play tough games because they’re the best players by far. And all of a sudden, every game they play is a T-shirt. They have blackout day, ‘GameDay,’ the most viewed game — all those things. We’ve played a lot of big games, and I do think it prepares us for this moment where everyone thinks it’s the biggest game.”<doc-sep>No. 9 seed Central Florida had top overall seed Duke up against the wall, poised to pull off one of the biggest upsets in March Madness history against a team with two national player of the year candidates and NBA top picks in Zion Williamson and R.J. Barrett. Ultimately, it was Williamson's bulldozing basket against 7-foot-6 center Tacko Fall and R.J. Barrett's put-back — both plays made in the final 14 seconds — that saved Duke's national title pursuit in the 77-76 thriller. But it was another star who stole the NCAA tournament's first weekend — even in defeat. Aubrey Dawkins came out firing on all cylinders and was the backbone behind the Knights' monumental upset attempt. The 6-6 junior guard, son of coach Johnny Dawkins, finished with 32 points on 12-for-18 shooting from the floor. Every time Duke punched with a surge of momentum, it was Dawkins spearheading a UCF rally as if to say, "not so fast." More:No. 1 Duke barely holds off Central Florida at buzzer in classic game More:The six defining plays that shaped Duke and Central Florida's March Madness classic While Dawkins' missed dunk in the closing minutes and a last-second tip-in attempt that rimmed out at the buzzer will stick with college basketball fans wishing for a legendary upset, what Dawkins did before that is what made Sunday's game an all-time classic. UCF had no shot without his heroics. It was Dawkins' scoring in the first half that made this a game from the onset. It was Dawkins' 3-pointer less than two minutes into the second half that shifted the momentum for UCF. It was his dunk with 11:25 left that knotted the score at 54 and then his assist to B.J. Taylor on the next play to give the Knights their first lead of the second half. When Duke was looking to pull away with 6½ minutes left, Dawkins made another three to keep UCF within striking distance. Brackets:Follow March Madness Dawkins' jumper with 3:10 left gave UCF a 72-70 lead and then his assist to Fall put the Knights up 74-70 with 2:09 remaining. If there was ever a moment when Duke, the national title favorite by a mile, was feeling the possibility of its season ending prematurely, it was then. And Dawkins' will had everything to do with it. Uniquely, Dawkins grew up with Duke basketball in his life with his father, a Duke player in the 1980s, serving on coach Mike Krzyzewski's staff for 11 years. That's what made winning so painful for Coach K, who remembered the younger Dawkins around the Durham campus as a kid. "I feel bad that they lost. It's the yin an the yang here because they were deserving of winning," Krzyzewski added at the postgame news conference. "I feel so proud that those kids played at the level of their coach (Johnny Dawkins). ...It's a tough moment. It's going to take me a little while to get through it. Same thing with Aubrey. You see him grow up from a little guy." Even in defeat, it was the younger Dawkins who Krzyzewski remembered growing up giving one of his most talented teams ever the ultimate scare. "(Dawkins) was magnificent. Not sensational. Magnificent," Krzyzewski said during the CBS interview.<doc-sep>COLUMBIA, S.C. – Central Florida coach Johnny Dawkins stands, arms folded, intensely following the ball as the starting unit weaves in and out of its offensive options at a practice earlier this season. The sound of sneakers squeaking and the thump from passes as leather meets flesh is dominant with no defense on the floor — until Aubrey Dawkins takes a handoff from Tacko Fall and casually flicks a pass toward B.J. Taylor that sails out of bounds. “Yeah, yeah, my bad,” Johnny Dawkins says sarcastically. “Get on the baseline. To turn it over in 5-on-0 is pathetic. That’s pathetic.” Aubrey’s head tilts and with his eyebrows furrowed, he looks as if he wants to say, “It’s like that?” But he already knows the answer as the entire unit lines up to run full-court sprints. It is indeed like that. He’s supposed to know better than that.<doc-sep>COLUMBIA, S.C. — It was UCF junior Aubrey Dawkins who flew above everyone to get his fingertips on the ball, tipping it toward the goal just before the game clock expired, because of course it would be the son of the Knights coach who would try to do one more incredible thing to deliver his father the greatest victory of his coaching career. There was no disputing it left his hand in time. The only matter in question as it traveled the few short inches toward the goal involved whether it would drop through the rim and into the net or fall to the floor as a missed field goal attempt. One way would present UCF with a victory over the nation’s No. 1 team, Duke, and be stored as an eternal highlight in NCAA Tournament history. The other would allow the Blue Devils to continue playing as if they hadn’t just been shaken to their core. If measured with a Rolex or a Patek Philippe — or, for that matter, the game clock at Colonial Life Arena — the amount of time Dawkins’ tip attempt hung on the rim might not fill even a half-second. In Human Dreams Standard Time, it felt like it was up there for a day. SN's MARCH MADNESS HQ Live NCAA bracket | Live scoreboard | Full TV schedule​ “In my head, it was just: 'Not like this, not like this, not like this,'” Duke forward Javin DeLaurier told Sporting News. “That would have been the most painful way for this season, with this group, to end: In the Round of 32, on a buzzer-beater.” He’d been assigned to defend the inbound pass from the sideline with 8.1 seconds left, and, fixated on UCF guard BJ Taylor’s drive down the right side, he’d missed Dawkins sliding in to his left. Dawkins had scored 32 points, making 12 of 18 shots, when he arrived above the rim and saw Taylor’s attempt at a floater catch the back rim and bounce back to the right. With no one else airborne to challenge him — Duke All-American Zion Williamson was focused on boxing out on the opposite block, point guard Tre Jones was out of the play on the right baseline after Taylor drove by to shoot and RJ Barrett was at the foul line defending his man and Cam Reddish was on the left wing doing the same — Dawkins got his right hand on the ball and guided it to the left. At that moment, it didn’t really matter that Dawkins’ father, Johnny, had played four years of college under Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski and won the Naismith Award in 1986 and served as a member of his coaching staff for a decade. It didn’t matter how close the two remained, that Coach K viewed Johnny as the most important recruit of his career. It only mattered that one team would continue in this tournament and one would not, that we would see one of the most colossal tournament upsets or the kind of narrow escape that sometimes serve as compelling anecdotes told by NCAA champions. “Honestly, I thought it was going in. I thought it was going in,” Duke point guard Jordan Goldwire told SN. He was leaning off the Duke bench to get a better look. “It just bounced our way. We got a rebound. And the rest is just excitement.” BERNSTEIN: Duke needs to give Zion more help Center Marques Bolden, who played 10 minutes as he recovers from a knee injury and was out of the game at the time, told SN it was difficult to put his thoughts about that moment into words. “Man, it all happened so fast,” he told SN. “It was a great effort by them, the last-second shot and everything. I’m just glad we came up with a tough stop, and important stop, at the end.” It is certainly within the realm of nonfiction to call it a “tough stop.” It would be more truthful to call it good fortune, or a blessing. “I was just hoping for it to fall out, exactly as it did,” Jones said. “It looked like it was almost falling back in, but with the rims how tight they are, he wasn’t able to get the bounce they wanted. I was just happy that happened, happy to be alive still and be one of the final 16 teams." It was almost a year ago to the day — 364 days, to be precise — the Devils had a shot to beat Kansas in regulation in the NCAA Midwest Region final and earn a trip to the Final Four. Senior guard Grayson Allen tried a pull-up jumpshot there, and that ball spent perhaps even more time on the rim than Dawkins' tip. It, likewise, spun out. Duke lost in OT. "I've been on both sides of the coin now," DeLaurier said. "We're 50-50. I think it's evened out."<doc-sep>
COLUMBIA, S.C. — The coach’s son was having the game of his life in the biggest game of his dad’s life. Down 1, UCF’s Aubrey Dawkins pushed a miss back up with his right hand with 2.5 seconds left. The ball bounced once, twice and then rolled off the rim. Overall No. 1 NCAA Tournament seed Duke survived to reach the Sweet 16. Dawkins, the son of UCF coach Johnny Dawkins who shot hoops with his dad on the Blue Devils home court when Johnny was a Duke assistant, hung his head as his teammates hit the floor. “Heartbreak. That’s the only way to sum it up.” Aubrey Dawkins quietly recalled 20 minutes later to reporters. Nothing left to do but console his teammates, sprawled across the floor after the 77-76 loss where UCF led 76-73 with 14 seconds left when Duke’s Zion Williamson drove right at UCF’s 7-foot-6 Tacko Fall. The superstar Williamson hit the layup while drawing the big man’s fifth and final foul. R.J. Barrett put back Williamson’s miss for the winning basket. B.J. Taylor drove on UCF’s last chance, but the short jumper came off the glass just a little too hard. Dawkins swooped in and… “It was up there forever, I felt like, in slow motion. Once I saw it go past the midpoint and roll out, it was, at that point, nothing left to do,” he said. Dawkins was the only reason UCF had a chance at the end. He scored 32 points — matching Williamson — on 12 of 18 shooting, including 5 of 7 on 3-pointers. He also had four assists and two offensive rebounds, including the putback he rolled off the rim. After the miss, he sank to his knees next to the frame supporting the basket. “Aubrey was the best player on the court today. He was magnificent,” said Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, who told reporters he was close to tears, heartbroken for the opposing coach who helped build Duke into a powerhouse in the mid-1980s and the boy he watched grow up in shooting sessions after practice with his dad in Cameron Indoor Stadium. Johnny Dawkins, who addressed his sobbing players in an emotional locker room speech after the loss, was the point guard for Krzyzewski’s first Final Four team. “Proud of you man, proud of you,” Johnny Dawkins said, hugging his son. “I know it’s hard. I know it’s hard.” Aubrey Dawkins wanted to go to Stanford and play for his dad, but the school didn’t admit him, saying he didn’t meet their academic standards. Johnny Dawkins said Saturday that may have been a blessing in disguise. He loved his son, but wasn’t sure he could coach him after spending so much time with him on the court through the boy’s childhood. Aubrey Dawkins spent his first two seasons at Michigan, but after his dad left Stanford for the Knights, the son decided to join him at UCF. Just before the 2017-18 season started, Aubrey Dawkins suffered a season-ending injury. He came back and averaged 15 points this season, but maybe more importantly, Aubrey Dawkins said he got to play for his dad. “Having the chance to be around him at this stage in my life and my career in basketball has just been priceless. That’s what I love most, just going every day next to him and learning from him and us getting closer as a father and son and also as a player and coach,” Dawkins said. And the father said his son playing like he did in the most important game of their lives meant a lot to him, too. “Aubrey was terrific. He’s capable of having moments like that, and he had one tonight on one of the biggest stages you could have it on,” Johnny Dawkins said. “He couldn’t have picked a better time for that.”