SAN ANTONIO — The crowd at the Final Four is often filled with college basketball dignitaries.
In the front row of the Alamodome on Saturday sat Jim Boeheim, Mark Few, Scott Drew, Nate Oats and Tubby Smith. Mike Krzyzewski, Hakeem Olajuwon, Dwight Howard and Carmelo Anthony were also in the building.
But when Florida star Walter Clayton Jr. lit up the Alamodome with a 34-point effort in his team’s 79-73 victory over Auburn, the same group of basketball veterans who had seen it all before reacted as if perhaps they hadn’t.
“That Walter Clayton Jr. is the real deal,” said Roy Williams, who coached Michael Jordan as an assistant at North Carolina under Dean Smith, from his seat near midcourt. “He’s the real deal.”
In his latest extraordinary, come-from-behind effort, Clayton matched history. Before Saturday, only Larry Bird had scored 30 points or more in back-to-back Elite Eight and Final Four games. Clayton’s effort Saturday followed a 30-point contribution in a win over Texas Tech, which had a nine-point lead with 3:14 to play.
That’s why Clayton’s teammates weren’t surprised.
“I feel like everybody sees it,” Florida guard Will Richard said after Saturday’s game. “He’s poised, calm and collected, confident in himself. We have that confidence in him. We see him practice. We see his work ethic. We’re glad everybody else is getting to see him do it in a game.”
“He’s incredible,” added Thomas Haugh, who, along with Alijah Martin (17 points) and Clayton, was one of three Gators in double figures. “On and off the court, he’s a great dude. We trust him in those situations. He knocks down big shots day after day.”
From the beginning of Saturday’s matchup, everything Auburn coach Bruce Pearl feared in his team’s second meeting with Florida had come true.
Clayton, who scored 19 points in a 90-81 win at Auburn on Feb. 8, hit 3-pointers from multiple spots. He scored in traffic. He made a layup from an impossible angle after halftime. He hit a 3-pointer to cut Auburn’s lead in the second half, too. And when he finished a three-point play with a layup after a foul in the final minutes, the obit on Auburn’s 2024-25 season was nearly finished.
“Clayton has been the best guard on the floor every single night,” Pearl said Friday. “Clayton can’t be the best guard on the floor tomorrow.”
But he was, only two months after he had been the best guard on the floor in Florida’s win over Auburn in SEC play.
The Gators will play in the national title game for the first time since 2007, when they won their second national title in a row.
On Saturday, Florida’s postgame locker room was not only the scene of a celebration but also a chance for Clayton’s biggest fans to convey why they weren’t scared when the team was down by nine points — the same margin it erased late against Texas Tech — early in the second half.
Gators center Micah Handlogten and his teammates had predicted the outcome at halftime. With 20 minutes left, they told one another, Auburn had left too much time on the clock for Clayton.
“The fact that he can go out there tonight and score 34 points and get us to a national championship is just amazing,” Handlogten said. “I can’t really explain it. He never shows too much emotion. He always just has this little mean mug on and he just hoops.”
Those who play with Clayton said they also become fans when the AP first-team All-American enters what multiple teammates called a “zone” that they can feel approaching as he heats up. The shots that shouldn’t fall always seem to during those stretches. And when they do, the Gators know that they can take control of the game.
“I feel like he’s in the zone every time he touches the rock,” Sam Alexis said about his team’s confidence amid adversity with Clayton on the roster. “We’ve got Walt. He’s going to let it fly.”
Added Denzel Aberdeen, who has played with Clayton since they were on the same AAU team in middle school: “You always look in the sky and see it go through the net and you’re like, ‘Oh my goodness, he’s like that.'”
Auburn’s game plan against Clayton was the byproduct of hours of film. In some ways, it worked. Clayton did not get a multitude of open looks. But even when his shots were challenged, they still went in.
“We will go back and watch the film and you’re going to see three or four, just highly contested, high-degree-of-difficulty shots, but that’s why he is one of the best players in college basketball because he’s able to do those things,” said Steven Pearl, Auburn’s associate head coach. “So hats off to him. Obviously, he did an unbelievable job of willing them to a national championship game.”
But Clayton wants more.
On Monday night, he’ll have a chance to lead his team to its third national title and first championship in nearly two decades when it takes on Houston, a 70-67 winner over Duke in Saturday’s late semifinal.
Also, with another effort like the one he’s had over the past two games, he’ll have a chance to join the lineage of Final Four stars who are known by one name. Laettner. Mateen. Carmelo. Kemba. AD. Shabazz. Tyus. DiVincenzo. Tristen.
Clayton?
If, after Saturday’s win, Clayton felt the weight of that possibility, he never showed it. Throughout Saturday’s game, his teammates noted his calm demeanor.
Knowing Clayton can’t be rattled has become a problem in the NCAA tournament — for everyone else.
“That’s just me, I guess,” Clayton said. “Don’t get too high, don’t get too low.”
