The first round of the greatest playoff in sports is just 60 minutes away, but Longhorn Road Trip has your fix in the meantime. For the last nine days, we’ve been counting down the greatest finishes in NCAA tournament history, and today we reach the end of our list.

Jim Valvano‘s Wolfpack of NC State met the University of Houston in the 1983 NCAA finals, huge underdogs against a Cougar team that had won 26 straight coming into the championship. With 44 seconds left, NC State had the ball in a tie ballgame. Without the modern shot clock, the Wolfpack was able to work the ball around in a Four Corners set, although Houston’s Clyde Drexler came within inches of stealing the ball for a possible game-winning fast break. After another near-steal, Dereck Whittenburg threw up a desperation heave with four seconds to go that completely missed the iron. But Lorenzo Charles was in the perfect position, catching the airball in time for a championship-winning putback dunk.

The video here starts with a little over a minute to go, but it’s worth it to watch the whole thing. The impatient folks who want to cut to the chase can skip to the 2-minute mark of the video.

When I started this feature, the most common question I heard from friends and readers was “Where do you have the Laettner shot?” Many thought it would be the number one play on the countdown, but instead it finds a home at the number two slot. Some may disagree with the choice, but I truly feel that there is one better buzzer beater — that’s called alliteration, kids — and we’ll check that one out tomorrow morning before the tournament kicks off.

If the Bryce Drew shot isn’t the most famous play in NCAA tournament history, this one has to be. Kentucky and Duke were locked in an epic battle from Philadelphia’s Spectrum, with a trip to the 1992 Final Four on the line. The game was so closely contested that 40 minutes of regulation weren’t enough, and after 4 minutes and 58 seconds of overtime, the two teams were still only separated by a point.

Duke had to travel the length of the floor with only 2.1 seconds to go, trailing 103-102. Grant Hill was triggering the inbounds completely unguarded, as the Wildcats decided to put all five defenders in the frontcourt. With no one to impede his vision or his heave, he threw a baseball pass that set up Laettner’s famous move…

The play became a prevalent pop-culture touchstone, with ESPN even tapping Chris Farley to spoof it for a commercial spot the following year. I loved it as a youngster and enacted my own versions of his clumsiness in the driveway, but it’s still just as funny now and deserves a second look.

At this point, you may be asking yourself how I can put the “Game of the Century” — as Farley screamed it — in only second place. But bear with me, dear readers. There’s still one more moment that we all know and love which had even greater implications than Laettner’s clutch shot. And it’ll be here on Longhorn Road Trip tomorrow morning, just in time to get you ready for 12 hours of basketball heaven.

While fans may have been familiar with many of the buzzer beaters seen so far in our countdown, if not all of them, the clip seen today at number three may be new to you. We go all the way back to the 1981 tournament for this buzzer beater. The location? Our very own Frank Erwin Center. The teams? Defending champion Louisville, who was seeded 4th, and Arkansas, the 5-seed who had advanced after beating Mercer in the first round. And on the sidelines were two coaches who are now both legendary, Denny Crum for Louisville and Eddie Sutton for the Hogs.

Down 73-71, Arkansas had the ball with only fives seconds left to play and the length of the court in front of them. But U.S. Reed only needed to go half of that distance to make the game-winner…

According to Rivals.com, Reed is now a pastor in Arkansas after a break pro career. After being drafted by the Kansas City Kings, he failed to make the roster and spent the 1982 season in the CBA. The following summer he had a training-camp stint with the Spurs, but a knee injury cost him the season and effectively ended his career.

For today’s buzzer beater countdown, we revisit one of the most famous plays in tournament history.

Down by two to Ole Miss, Bryce Drew of Valparaiso tried to hit the go-ahead three as time wound down. But his shot clanged off the front iron and Ansu Sesay came down with a huge rebound with only 4.1 seconds to go. Following the foul, Sesay choked on the front end of his one-and-one and the carom was tipped out of bounds by the Rebels. That left Drew and Valpo with 2.5 seconds to go the length of the floor with no timeouts…

Keep an eye out for current Baylor coach Scott Drew as an assistant for his dad in this clip.

We’re back in Austin after an absolutely exhausting weekend of basketball and an all-night drive home, and I’m ready to sleep for about 86.3 hours. But first let’s talk a little about the bracket.

While it was certainly disappointing to lose to Kansas in the conference tournament finals again, things worked out incredibly well. If Texas would have earned a 1-seed in Detroit by winning the game, perhaps that loss was the best possible outcome. Texas now has the route of Little Rock-Houston-San Antonio if they win their games, which is reassuringly similar to the Birmingham-San Antonio-New Orleans route that the 2003 Final Four team took.

Oddly enough, I’ve seen Austin Peay play in person this season, as Bear and I stopped in Nashville when we were traveling to the Michigan State game in December. The game was at Belmont that night, and the one memory that stands out most in my mind was how sloppy the Governors were with the ball, nearly choking away a 17 or 18-point lead to the Bruins late in the game. I’ll have to dig up my notes and media info from that one to give a more detailed Austin Peay preview later in the week.

The CBS storyline machine is already working overtime, as former Rick Barnes assistant Frank Haith could coach against his mentor if the Miami Hurricanes and Longhorns both win in the first round… Up in Omaha, it’s a match-up of super freshmen when Michael Beasley and O.J. Mayo tangle. And we also can’t forget that Mayo’s former high school teammate Bill Walker is also on K-State… If Winthrop pulls the first round upset, they could face Notre Dame in the second round, which would be a rematch of the first-round game in Spokane last season where the Eagles upset the Fighting Irish.

Is Wisconsin undervalued as a 3-seed? While they only lost four games this year, their SOS of 61 really paled in comparison to most of the other 2 and 3-seeds, so moving them up a line might have been a stretch. But when you consider the road awaiting Duke in this tournament, I’m not sure any of the 3-seeds would’ve wanted to be bumped up. If they get by Belmont, the Blue Devils have to face the winner of West Virginia and Arizona, which is one hell of a second-round test for a 2-seed. And if Duke does happen to survive to the second weekend, they get to fly out to Phoenix with a potential Elite Eight game against UCLA awaiting. I guess even the anointed Blue Devils can’t get the sweetheart treatment when they go 5-4 to finish the year.

Have any other thoughts or storylines I missed in this pre-dawn post? Leave them in the comments section below as we talk hoops all week long leading up to the tourney.