Florida Atlantic edges Kansas State to reach Final Four

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The Florida Atlantic Owls came out of nowhere. They had no NCAA Tournament wins in school history before this season.

Their last 20-win finish came in 2010-11, under former St. John’s coach Mike Jarvis.

Nobody saw them coming — all season or Saturday night.

Kansas State and Markquis Nowell, the diminutive guard from Harlem, were the headliners.

And the Wildcats were in control. They led by six with barely 8 ¹/₂ minutes left in the East Region final and seemed ready to pull away.

Nowell had just nailed another deep 3-pointer, this one off the glass, and he shrugged his shoulders when it dropped as Michael Jordan once did in the 1992 NBA Finals.

Nondescript Florida Atlantic, out of Conference USA, didn’t blink. The Owls took over the Garden down the stretch, just as they had Thursday night against Tennessee, making all the big plays to book a stunning trip to the Final Four in Houston next weekend.

The ninth-seeded Owls will play for a spot in the national championship next Saturday after they down No. 3 Kansas State, 79-76.

“They’re going to label us whatever, but we’re some pit bulls and rottweilers,” said forward Alijah Martin, who scored 17 points. “We go out there and show it every night.”

Florida Atlantic (35-3), balanced and tough-minded, ripped off a 15-1 run in just under six minutes following that Nowell 3-pointer, turning a 63-57 deficit into a 72-64 lead.

The Wildcats rallied and had a chance to tie as the clock ticked down. But the Owls hung on when Ismael Massoud couldn’t get off a potential game-tying 3-pointer at the horn.

Fitting for this group without stars, Florida Atlantic’s leading scorer on this night, Martin, wasn’t even named to the East Region All-Tournament team.

Four different Owls scored in double figures and they were dominant on the glass (44-22). The Owls were led by 7-foot Russian Vladislav Goldin (14 points, 13 rebounds, two blocks).

“When you draw up plays with X’s and O’s, on some teams, all the O’s don’t have to be guarded so you can put your X’s in the right spot to make it hard for the team to score on offense,” Kansas State coach Jerome Tang said. “Every one of his O’s can score the ball, and that’s what makes it hard to guard. It doesn’t matter if they can score 30. They can all shoot, they can all dribble, they can all pass, and that puts your defense in a bind.”

Nowell, after notching 30 points and 12 assists, was named the Most Outstanding Player of the region.

The Owls didn’t care — they’re moving on as the fourth mid-major program to ever reach the Final Four.

Florida Atlantic is a throwback team, a group that has been together for multiple years. Even their two transfers, Goldin and Bryan Greenlee, have been around for a few years.

They won 13 games in 2020-21, 19 last season and a whopping 35 so far this season. Coach Dusty May’s group is an anomaly in the transfer portal era, a unit that has chosen stability over brighter lights.

“You’re always concerned [about players leaving] because they’re getting recruited now. They’ve been recruited through this tournament,” May said. “There’s so many outside parties. It’s part of it. Our job as coaches is to do the best job we can every single minute of every single day to provide the environment that they think this is the best thing for them long-term. … And the missing piece that is understated is these guys truly love each other, and when you love your teammates, it’s hard to go jump into deep waters that you don’t know what’s out there.”

The Owls began to believe this could be a special season when they knocked off in-state rival Florida on Nov. 14.

Five days later, they beat Detroit Mercy by 21. Detroit’s coach, Mike Davis, came into the Florida Atlantic locker room, and told the Owls he hadn’t seen a team like theirs in years. They could, Davis said then, reach the Final Four.

“Who is this guy?” May recalled his bemused players asking him.

But those experiences created a swagger within Florida Atlantic, and it only built as the wins piled up.

The Owls trailed in the final 10 minutes of all four of their tournament victories. Each time, this group closed like it was used to the pressure of March Madness. By now, the Owls are certain they belong among the nation’s elite, and they will have the stage to prove it in Houston.

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