kentucky wildcats beats kansas jayhawks in national championship game 67-59 highlights 4/2/12

NEW ORLEANS — No matter where Anthony Davis and his buddies go to make their millions, their ol' Kentucky home will long remember this championship season.

The Wildcats hit the jackpot with their lottery picks Monday night, ignoring Davis' bad shooting night and parlaying a roster full of NBA talent into a 67-59 victory over Kansas for the team's eighth national title – and its first since 1998.

The one-and-doners did it in a wire-to-wire victory – a little dicey at the end – to cap a season in which anything less than bringing a title back to the Bluegrass State would have been a downer. They led coach John Calipari to his first title in four trips to the Final Four with three different schools.

Doron Lamb, a sophomore with first-round-draft-pick possibilities, led the Wildcats (38-2) with 22 points, including back-to-back 3-pointers that put them up by 16 with 10 minutes left.

The Jayhawks (32-7), kings of the comeback all season, fought to the finish and trimmed that deficit to five with 1:37 left. But Kentucky made five free throws down the stretch to seal the win

Davis' fellow lottery prospect, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, was another headliner, creating space for himself to score all 11 of his points in the first half.

Davis, meanwhile, might have had the most dominating six-point night in the history of college basketball. He finished with 16 rebounds, six blocks, five assists and three steals – and made his only field goal with 5:13 left in the game. It was a surefire illustration of how the 6-foot-10 freshman can exert his will on a game even on a rare night when the shot isn't falling.Normally, the prospect of losing all those players in one swoop would have people thinking about a tough rebuilding year.

But Cal has mastered the art of rebuilding on the fly.

He's the coach who brings in the John Walls, Brandon Knights and Derrick Roses (at Memphis) for cups of coffee, lets them sharpen up their resumes, then happily says goodbye when it becomes obvious there's nothing left for them to do in school.

The coach won't apologize for the way he recruits or how he runs his program. Just playing by the rules as they're set up, he says, even if he doesn't totally agree with them. Because he refuses to promise minutes or shots to any recruit and demands teamwork out of all of them, he says he comes by these players honestly.

He has produced nine first-round picks in the last four drafts with a few more coming. This latest group will have an NCAA title in tow and the everlasting love of a fan base that bleeds basketball.