Kansas fans celebrated a replay of the 2008 national championship like it just happened

Kansas fans really miss March Madness.

The Kansas Jayhawks would have gone into this year’s NCAA tournament as the prohibitive favorites to cut down the nets in Atlanta, having finished the season ranked No. 1 in every major poll.

But as we know, the 2020 NCAA tournament was canceled amid the coronavirus pandemic, which has left a huge void for college basketball fans and, well, CBS’ programming schedule.

So, Kansas fans made due with a replay.

On Sunday, CBS aired a full replay of the 2008 National Championship Game — the overtime classic between Kansas and the Derrick Rose-led Memphis team. Kansas overcame a nine-point deficit in just over two minutes and tied the game with a Mario Chalmers 3 to send the game into overtime.

Bill Self and Chalmers both live-tweeted the game, which was great. Chalmers was calling his shot while Self threw out some conspiracy theories about Memphis squirting water on the court to force a turnover.

But when the game ended (again) in a 75-68 Kansas win, Kansas fans drove to downtown Lawrence and celebrated a championship from their cars as if it had just happened — waving flags and honking their horns. It was a social-distanced celebration 12 years later.

Kansas won’t actually get to celebrate a championship this year — though the Jayhawks have the best claim to the title — but that made for a fun distraction nonetheless.

[jwplayer pKS8kcq0-D3ux87Cq]