MORAGA, Calif. (AP) — Omar Samhan scored more than 700 baskets, grabbed over 1,000 rebounds, scored nearly 2,000 points and played on the winning side in nearly 100 college basketball games at Saint Mary’s.
Yet for most college basketball fans, the memories of Samhan over those four years boil down to one magical weekend in Providence, R.I., last March, when Samhan helped the Gaels become one of the darlings of last year’s NCAA tournament by beating Richmond and Villanova in the first two rounds.
Those 80 minutes of basketball and countless quips before, during and after news conferences turned the player from the tiny school in the bucolic Oakland hills into a household name for a brief moment.
