March Madness doesn’t get bigger than this. Two No. 1 seeds fighting for one title. The Houston Cougars are coming off a 70-67 win over Duke. Meanwhile, the Florida Gators took down Auburn 79-73. Both teams sit at 35-4 with headliners like LJ Cryer and Walter Clayton Jr. front and center.
But as the game unfolded, one player made the biggest impact—and it wasn’t Cryer or Clayton. It was Ja’Vier Francis.
Ja’Vier Francis Comes Through for the Cougars
The first half was tight. Early on, the score was 8-8. But that didn’t last. In came Ja’Vier Francis, the 6-foot-8 senior forward from New Orleans. In the 14th minute of the first half, Francis changed the energy in the Alamodome with a dunk.
It started like a regular possession. Cryer brought the ball up the court, stayed patient and found Francis cutting to the rim. Francis caught the pass and rose over Florida’s Alex Condon for the finish.
JA’VIER FRANCIS POSTER OMG 😱#MarchMadness pic.twitter.com/z7Lbjo4Spg
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) April 8, 2025
The Cougars took a two-point lead and went to 10. This moment shifted the momentum.
Now, this is not a simple dunk. It was a message, too. Florida’s Alijah Martin had just gotten stuffed on a poster attempt minutes earlier. It was the kind of in-your-face, chest-thumping play that makes March Madness .. madness.
And while Florida’s Will Richard was keeping the Gators alive with back-to-back threes, Houston’s defense kept making life hard for them. Joseph Tugler and J’Wan Roberts were swatting shots away. And there was no questioning the Cougars’ inside game.
To make it even better, Francis is no one-trick pony. The senior is Houston’s not-so-secret weapon. He has averaged six points and nearly five boards in the postseason but always shows his abilities for plays like his posterizing dunk all throughout his career.
He’s show he can come up clutch when his team needs him as well. In the Sweet 16, against Purdue, Francis had eight points and five rebounds. Back in the first round, he had 13 points and eight boards.
Francis is a man from New Orleans who has earned All-Big 12 Honorable Mention this season and has been a reliable piece of Coach Kelvin Sampson’s squad. And in the title game, the Cougars took Francis’ lead into halftime as he truly stole the momentum.
KEEP READING: How Kelvin Sampson Turned Houston Into a Contender
It’s safe to say, if Houston pulled off this game, they’ll long since remember the name: Ja’Vier Francis.
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