Few things go hand-in-hand more than BYU basketball legend Jimmer Fredette and March Madness. One of the greatest college hoopers of all time, whose distinct three-point heavy style and ability to drop long-range bombs from just about anywhere inside the half-court line made BYU hoops appointment viewing during his National Player of the Year season, and FanSided brought him in to share his thoughts on the greatest sporting event on the calendar.
March Madness. The excitement. The agony. The jubilation of witnessing your team weave through the grizzled gauntlet of each subsequent round. The bottomless pit of torment that comes from an early exit.
Potential number-one pick AJ Dybantsa and the sixth-seeded BYU Cougars were eliminated early by an upset-minded Texas squad that was eventually stopped with a Purdue buzzer-beater in the Sweet 16, so with his alma mater now history, Fredette turned his attention to Duke, a team he had rushing beyond the Final Four.
Enter Braylon Mullins and the UConn Huskies, with a shot that the BYU great believes stands as one of the five greatest shots in March Madness history, alongside Laettner's dagger against Kentucky, Mario Chalmers sending the championship to overtime
"I was thinking about this. I think it's in my top five," Fredette said. "When you put the stakes, as well as who it was against, and how improbable it was. First of all the comeback was improbable and how it happened in real-time -- there was no timeouts!"
"They didn't set up a play or anything like that. He tipped it, he grabbed it, he passed it and they passed it back and he shot it from 40 [feet] and they won the game. [...] I put it in my top five."
Fredette also shared his thoughts on AJ Dybantsa, describing how he expects most BYU fans would want to see the BYU standout play with the Utah Jazz, but as a New York native and lifelong Knicks fan, he's accepting the fact that Dybantsa likely won't build a home in Madison Square Garden.
You can watch the full interview with Jimmer here: