But if South Carolina set out on Sunday to show that an N.C.A.A. title could be all but won in a contest’s first four minutes, even against a mighty, feisty, unbowed Connecticut, consider the hypothesis pressure-tested and proven on the sport’s greatest stage.
The makings of a rout would ebb in certain moments, but the Gamecocks eventually defeated the Huskies with ease, 64-49, to claim the second national championship in their history.
The principal trouble for UConn on a night full of them was that there was barely ever any time for a fight that never seemed all that fair.