March Madness Moments: Brett Blizzard and UNC Wilmington Catch USC in an Avalanche

UNC Wilmington returns to the NCAA Tournament in 2025, looking to repeat its memorable win from the 2002 edition of March Madness.

UNC Wilmington stood at the doorstep of the NCAA Tournament a few times under coach Takayo Siddle before breaking through in 2025. The Seahawks took Charleston to the wire in a thrilling 2023 CAA Championship Game in the second of what became four straight 21-plus-win seasons this year.

The 2025 CAA title game was another nail-biter, this time going UNCW’s way in a 76-72 win over a Delaware team that struggled throughout the regular season—including losing an 88-58 blowout at UNCW’s Trask Coliseum less than two weeks ago—but got red-hot during the conference tournament.

For UNCW, this ticket to the Big Dance is a long time coming. Having last made the field in 2017, the program hardly had to endure a wait comparable to CAA regular-season champion Towson—upended as part of Delaware’s unlikely run to the championship round—which hasn’t made the NCAA Tournament since 1991.

But given the standard the program established from the outset of the 21st century, and how quickly Siddle turned around a dire situation to be oh-so-close to regaining that standard, eight years could be considered a long wait.

Side note: Check out Seahawk Perch for all things UNCW in preparation for the Seahawks return to the Big Dance.

The 2025 edition of March Madness marks UNCW’s seventh trip to the NCAA Tournament, all since 2000. Siddle is the fourth Seahawks coach to guide a team there, following his former UNCW colleague Kevin Keatts, current Clemson coach Brad Brownell, and Jerry Wainwright, who oversaw the program’s first two trips.

Wainwright, whose career accomplishments include three regular-season CAA titles, an NCAA Tournament appearance with Richmond, and coaching DePaul to its last 20-win season, first reached March Madness in 2000.

After having regular-season title-winning teams in 1997 and 1998, it was a Seahawk bunch that finished the CAA slate as the definition of middling—8-8—to get in as the No. 15 seed. UNCW drew second-seed Cincinnati in an infamous tournament for the Bearcats, this being the season National Player of the Year Kenyon Martin broke his leg at the Conference USA Tournament.

UC’s hope for its first national championship in almost 40 years was dashed, but the Bearcats still handled the Seahawks in the first round, 64-47.

It wasn’t until its next NCAA Tournament appearance two years later that UNCW truly put its stamp on March Madness.

Growing up following sports in Pac-10/12 country, the USC basketball of my youth had an odd presence to it. The Trojans played in the dark and dingy Los Angeles Sports Arena—and while other Pac-10 venues were certainly dark and dingy, like Oregon’s McArthur Court, the Sports Arena was different in that it utterly lacked personality.

USC played second fiddle on the local scene to history-rich UCLA, and in the conference’s pecking order, was at least a tier below the Bruins, Arizona, and Stanford throughout the ‘90s.

Trojans teams were rarely bad but rarely reached the heights one might expect of a program based in one of the nation’s hottest recruiting spots, boasting seemingly unlimited potential. The 1991-92 Trojans were noteworthy outliers, building off of 1st Team All-American Harold Miner—cursed with the nickname “Baby Jordan”—and earning a No. 2 seed to the NCAA Tournament.

A USC team brimming with Final Four potential became a longstanding part of March Madness lore for all the wrong reasons. For years, CBS opened its introductory video montage with Al McGuire’s call of the James Forrest buzzer-beater that sent seventh-seeded Georgia Tech past USC and into the Sweet 16.

A decade later, the Trojans went into the Big Dance with a No. 4 seed, their best since 1992, and realistic Final Four aspirations after an Elite Eight run the year prior.

With the exception of big man Brian Scalabrine, USC coach Henry Bibby returned the entire corps responsible for the Trojans’ historic run to the 2001 Regional final: savvy point guard Brandon Granville, veteran forward David Bluthenthal, talented wing Desmond Farmer, and most notably, 2001-02 Pac-10 Player of the Year Sam Clancy.

For No. 13 UNCW to slow USC down, the Seahawks needed a force of nature—namely, a Blizzard.

Brett Blizzard started as a freshman on the 2000 Tournament team and earned All-CAA honors for the third time as a junior in 2002. Nothing Blizzard did in UNCW’s first-round matchup with USC was exceptional by the guard’s standards: He averaged 17.9 points and 2.7 made 3-pointers per game for the 2001-02 season, and Blizzard finished with 18 points and hit three 3-pointers against the Trojans.

Still, his performance in a 93-89 overtime win for the Seahawks stands as a testament to the power of March. Blizzard won All-CAA honors each of his four seasons at UNCW, culminating in taking CAA Player of the Year in 2003. He was a consistently excellent shooter and playmaker, but thanks to one game doing what he regularly did, Brett Blizzard became a nationally known name basketball fans still associate with that game, 23 years later.

Interestingly enough, he wasn’t the high scorer: That was Clancy, with 21 points. Blizzard led UNCW with 18, but was matched by Craig Callahan. What’s more, Blizzard was one of six Seahawks to score in double-figures.

UNCW’s first-ever NCAA Tournament was a true team win, making it all the more remarkable. Even more impressive is that the Seahawks had to recover from USC rallying from a 19-point deficit.

Those fluent in March Madness know the cadence well: An underdog builds a lead early, only for the higher seed to assert its dominance once the adrenaline wears off. It inevitably happens multiple times on Thursday and Friday every year.

You know the reaction well: The prospective Cinderella gets that deer-in-headlights look, commits self-inflicted errors, and the favorite makes big plays. In this case, however, UNCW forced USC into mistakes—most notably, forcing eight turnovers from the usually cool Granville.

The Seahawks answered the Trojans' rally with big plays. Blizzard’s leaning and-one in overtime is the signature moment from this game.

And, Blizzard told reporters after the win, it was USC that had that air of bewilderment down the stretch.

“We saw that panic look on their faces. We knew we had them on the ropes,” Blizzard said.

As Donovan Newby, Khamari McGriff, and coach Takayo Siddle head to the 2025 NCAA Tournament, 2002 remains the definitive standard UNCW chases. The following year’s team very nearly upstaged ‘02, taking reigning national champion Maryland to a buzzer-beater finish.

The two most recent Seahawks teams in the Dance gave Duke and Virginia fits until their ACC counterparts pulled away.

But if UNCW is to score its second win in March Madness history, the Seahawks might want to hope for forecasts calling for snowfall come this first round.