Basketball National Championship
By Jeff Moffitt
@moffittjc (123666)
Gainesville, Florida
April 10, 2025 10:48am CST
Okay, I'm a few days behind on this, but I did a lot of partying on Monday night and then spent the last few days trying to recover.
My alma mater, the University of Florida, won its third national championship in basketball on Monday night, beating the University of Houston 65-63 in a dramatic come-from-behind win. And although the game was played in San Antonio, Texas, the University of Florida opened its basketball arena to the public for a free watch party. The place was packed out with students and fans alike. And though it would have been fun to be at the arena watching the game with 10,000 other Gator fans, I was across the street at one of the bars watching the game on TV and drinking a few adult beverages. I knew that if the Gators won the national championship, the bars and the adjacent street would become the central location for the after-game celebrations, and I wanted to be right in the thick of it.
The game ended at 11:15pm, and the celebrations went on into the wee hours of the night. I think I finally got home around 4:00am, and then had to turn around and be at work at 7:00am. I should have just called out "sick," but I'm more responsible than that.
The University of Florida is now the only university in the nation with at least three national championships in football and basketball (the two biggest sports in university athletics). In addition, counting all sports offered in collegiate athletics, UF has now won at least one national championship for 16 consecutive years, a feat no other school even comes close to (yes, I'm a little proud of my university! lol).
The photo was taken from one of the bars on University Avenue after the game, as students and fans gathered in the street to celebrate.
Have any of you ever celebrated a big sports championship, whether in professional or college sports?
Hey @kareng, next up is the womens gymnastics championships. Think UF can win that natty? Although my heart is rooting for UF, and I think LSU deserves it, my money is on Oklahoma.
6 people like this
5 responses
@FourWalls (73615)
• United States
10 Apr
Yeah!! I played Molly Hatchet’s “Gator Country” to celebrate!
2 people like this
@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
10 Apr
Did you really? That's awesome!
I saw that the Empire State Building in New York City was lit up orange and blue to honor the Gators' win.
2 people like this
@FourWalls (73615)
• United States
10 Apr
@moffittjc — always gonna root for the SEC!
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@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
10 Apr
@FourWalls Awesome, and much appreciated! I do the same, even though some of the schools I root for are arch-enemies of the Gators!
Given where you live, you're not a fan of the ACC?
2 people like this
@kareng (72473)
• United States
11 Apr
Great come-back win! I'm just glad an SEC team got it!!
I'm sticking with my TIGERS! They beat OK in regular season, so it's time for a back to back National Championship for the Lady Tigers! I believe we are in opposite sessions, so could be up against UF in competition along the way. Top 2 team advance. So weird to have 8 teams in the finals now instead of 6!
1 person likes this
@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
11 Apr
The Gators are in the bracket with OK, so it’s going to be tough competition for them. Their score in the last meet didn’t break 198, which at this point is the minimum a team needs to score to stay in the hunt for a national championship.
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@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
13 Apr
@kareng I'm hoping that this long break before the next round gives the team a chance to regroup and work out any of the kinks in their routines. it also gives the gymnasts a chance to recover and heal from any injuries or nagging soreness. So, yes, anything is possible when competition resumes again.
And in addition, I'm hoping that our recent basketball championships fuels the fire on the gymnastics team and makes them even hungrier for their own national championship.
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@snowy22315 (187820)
• United States
10 Apr
Congrats to your team! It must have been really fun heading to work hung over..
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@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
10 Apr
When I was in college, I could party all night long and then go straight to work and not miss a beat. These days, it takes me an entire week to recover from a hangover. LOL. Which is why it took me so long to write this discussion.
2 people like this
@LindaOHio (186650)
• United States
12 Apr
I was in Calgary Ontario around 1967. I think the hockey team won a big championship; and the streets were crowded like that. The crowd started to get dicey, so we headed for transportation out of there. Congrats to UF!!!
1 person likes this
@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
4h
@LindaOHio It worked very well too. Out of such a large crowd in the streets celebrating the win, only one person successfully climbed a pole and was promptly arrested.
@moffittjc (123666)
• Gainesville, Florida
12 Apr
Inevitably, when you have large crowds like that, things can get out of control quickly. And add in young college students who are buzzed or drunk and you can have quite a mess on your hands. Fortunately, in our situation, both the city and the university did an amazing job with pre-victory marketing campaigns aimed at encouraging safe celebrations afterward. They estimated the street crowd at over 50,000 people, and of that number there were only 4 arrests the entire night. Both the city and the university greased all the streetlight and sign poles around the university ahead of time so that students couldn't climb them. And, unlike other championship celebrations where you see video footage of cars overturned, things set on fire, and stores lotted, this crowd was very well behaved and none of that stuffed happened.
1 person likes this
@LindaOHio (186650)
• United States
14 Apr
@moffittjc That's great. I like the idea of greasing the poles too.
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