Juwan Howard, Jimmy King, Ray Jackson, and Jalen Rose sit together during the NCAA title game between Michigan and Louisville at the Georgia Dome. (CBS screen grab)

The pregame festivities at the 2013 national championship game between Michigan and Louisville took a backseat to five guys who for some reason have been anointed as God’s gift to college basketball.

Meet Jalen Rose, Juwan Howard, Ray Jackson, Jimmy King and — yes, most notably — Chris Webber, also known as “The Fab Five.” Rose, Howard, King, and Jackson sat in the same section of the Georgia Down to watch their beloved Wolverines, but C-Webb decided to sit elsewhere — although his arrival created a bigger buzz than anyone else.

“I know you guys were surprised,” Rose told USA Today after Webber arrived Monday. “I am not surprised that he came. We’ve been friends since we were 12 years old.”

Rose added: “I knew he was going to be here and I’m excited that he’s here. It’s great for the university, it’s great for him and it’s great for the players.”

As entertaining as they were during their two years together, the Fab Five never won a Big Ten title nor did they win a national championship. They did go to two straight Final Fours, which is a big achievement, but fell short twice in the title game.

So why are they so beloved?

Part of the love affair with the Fab Five stems from the coverage they have received from ESPN and writer Mitch Albom, who authored the book “Fab Five.” Albom’s great writing skills elevated the Fab Five to undeserved legendary status. If you read the book it basically painted Rose, Webber, Howard, King, and Jackson as some sort of basketball pioneers who invented trash talking and baggy shorts, as if no else did these things before they arrived.

First of all, trash talking has been a part of basketball well before the Fab Five. As for the baggy shorts, Michael Jordan wore them first during the 1980s then Jerry Tarkanian’s UNLV Runnin’ Rebels made them fashionable in the early 1990s. All the Fab Five did was grow the shorts 2 inches longer and made it fashionable. If there’s major fashion statement the Fab Five contributed to the game were the black shoes and the black socks. They basically took Brad Sellar’s idea — who coordinated the all-black shoes for the Chicago Bulls in the ’80s — and added their own flavor.

Juwan Howard, Jalen Rose, and Chris Webber led Michigan to two straight appearances in the Final Four. (GETTY IMAGES)

ESPN is partly to blame for the whole Fab Five phenomenon, producing a documentary in 2011. Meanwhile, the 1989 Michigan squad that featured Glen Rice, Rumeal Robinson, Loy Vaught, Sean Higgins, and Terry Mills barely get a mention these days. They’re the real Fab Five!

The ’89 Wolverines coached by Steve Fisher is THE ONLY Michigan team to win a national championship, and left a bigger imprint in Ann Arbor than any Michigan squad. That’s the team that should be celebrated. What Rice and Co. accomplished in the ’89 NCAA Tournament run surpasses anything Webber and Co. accomplished in two years.

Webber’s presence at the 2013 NCAA championship game became a big story especially after his Detroit pal, Rose (now a commentator for ESPN) campaigned for him to move past hard feelings and reunite with the group.

Webber played a major part in having Michigan’s Final Four appearances in 1992 and 1993 vacated. His bitter falling out with the school came after the NCAA in 2003 required the school to disassociate him and three other players for 10 years, a punishment that ends in May.

But time heals all wounds and Webber seems to be coming around. He posted this on his Twitter account:

For the rest of his life, Webber will always be associated with one play: the timeout. He will never live that down because it turned out to be the defining moment of the 1993 national championship game against North Carolina. It painted Webber as the goat and became the butt of all jokes. Webber rarely talks about “the timeout,” which tells you he hasn’t gotten over that nightmare, and Rose believes it may be the reason why C-Webb wants to distance himself from his time at Michigan.

“I think the timeout had a lot to do with it,” Rose said on his podcast on Grantland.com. “I think he wants to disassociate himself with that moment and with that school — in theory, with us — to kind of rebuild his life mentally to say, ‘My career started my rookie year in the NBA.’ That’s unfortunate.”

The 2013 Michigan Wolverines lost to Louisville in the NCAA championship game, but their tournament run shouldn’t be overlooked. It has been two decades since Michigan’s basketball program has been relevant, and John Beilein’s squad should be commended for their great work.

Maybe 20 years from now we’ll be talking about Trey Burke and Co. instead of the overhyped Fab Five.

Joel Huerto is the editor and publisher of OneManFastBreak.net. Follow him on Twitter @onemanfastbreak.

Michigan coach John Beilein had a rough time in the national championship game. (GETTY IMAGES)

Michigan head coach John Beilein has no one to blame but himself after his Wolverines lost to Louisville, 82-76, in the 2013 national championship game at the Georgia Dome.

The game was an instant classic, as both teams went at each other like two prize fighters in Las Vegas. Michigan threw the first punch when reserve guard Spike Albrecht played the game of his life, scoring 17 points in the first half to power Michigan to a 12-point lead. Louisville countered with Luke Hancock, named the Final Four most outstanding player. Hancock scored 12 points in three minutes (all threes) to close the Cardinals to within one at halftime.

Beilein may have gotten caught up in all the excitement because he committed two crucial coaching mistakes: 1) he kept national player of the year Trey Burke on the bench far too long in the first half when Michigan had all the momentum, and 2) he dashed the Wolverines’ comeback hopes late when he lost track of team fouls.

USA Today’s Dan Wolken wrote:

Michigan coach John Beilein admitted he didn’t realize how many fouls his team had committed in the final minute of Monday’s 82-76 national championship loss to Louisville, a major error that affected the Wolverines’ strategy down the stretch.

“I thought we were in the 1-and-1,” Beilein said. “That falls on me.”

With Michigan trailing 78-74, it appeared the Wolverines got a key stop with 52 seconds left when Peyton Siva missed a runner. But Michigan freshman Caris LeVert stepped on the baseline while securing the rebound, turning the ball back over to Louisville and seemingly forcing an immediate foul situation – especially with Michigan only having five team fouls.

Instead, Michigan tried to play defense and force a turnover, wasting 13 precious seconds before center Gorgui Dieng got fouled. To Beilein’s surprise, however, that was only the Wolverines’ sixth team foul. By the time they committed the seventh and put Louisville at the foul line, just 29 seconds remained. Luke Hancock made both foul shots, extending the lead to 80-74.

Wasting those 23 seconds proved to be crucial, as Michigan got back within 80-76 but had only 14 seconds left to come back. Siva’s free throws with 12 seconds left iced the game.

Beilein should be commended for admitting his mistake in the final moments. He just dropped the ball, period. But that was only half the story. His misuse of Burke of Michigan in the first half was almost as egregious. Sure Burke had two fouls and sitting him may have been the safe play. But to win championships you have to take some chances, and Beilein didn’t roll the dice and trust that his All-American guard wouldn’t commit a third foul in the first half. After Burke picked up his second foul with about 12 minutes left in the first half, he never got off the bench.

Burke committed just one foul the rest of the game, and it was a questionable one too when he appeared to have all ball on Peyton Siva’s layup in the second half. That goes to show that Burke could have played despite the foul trouble. When Louisville made their run late in the first half, Beilein should have inserted Burke back in the game to halt the momentum. Instead he played it safe, rode with Albrecht, and allowed Louisville to regain the momentum and obliterate Michigan’s double-digit lead in three minutes.

Hindsight is always 20-20, but having Burke on the court certainly could have helped Michigan when Louisville made its run.

Joel Huerto is editor and publisher of OneManFastBreak.net. Follow him on Twitter @onemanfastbreak.

Former NBA player and Michigan standout Jalen Rose, right, arrive at the Nokia Theatre with Terrell Owens during the ESPY Awards in Los Angeles. (GETTY IMAGES)

First of, I like Jalen Rose. He’s very well-spoken and honest. Not enough athletes today spew opinions with brutal honesty, and Rose is in the minority. However, Rose went a little too far with his raw, uncensored commentary regarding the black players on Duke University in ESPN’s documentary feature on “The Fab Five” that aired on Selection Sunday.

In describing his hatred for Duke, the outspoken leader of University of Michigan’s famous freshman class in 1991 revealed that he thought Duke’s black athletes, specifically Grant Hill, were subservient to the white establishment and called them an “Uncle Tom.”

To borrow a line from my good friend Jason Reid, who is a columnist for the Washington Post, the term “Uncle Tom” is the worst thing one black man can direct at another black man. Reid later wrote that Rose’s “Uncle Tom” reference, misguided as it is, asserts that academic achievement and professional accomplishment affluence somehow reduces or eliminates a person’s “blackness.”

Rose had an opportunity to soften his stance and recant his statement on ESPN’s First Take a day later, but he wasn’t exactly apologetic.

Rose said, “As a 17-year-old recruit, that’s exactly how I felt. At that time, I felt like I was not good enough for certain stages. That’s just a fact. But also that’s something I used as motivation. Now, I understand what their program represents because I’m a mature adult. I know that it’s a private school. I know that do recruit from well-to-do, affluent families. But also understand some of the reason why so they do see some of their players selling their goods for money. Also, they want to get kids that would represent the program the right way. I get all of that. But, that’s the minority. I was speaking for the majority. That’s exactly how I felt then. It wasn’t an individual, it wasn’t somebody 20 years later.”

When Rose was asked if Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski would recruit him now, Rose said “I think would recruit my kids.”

“I don’t think they would have recruited me. I never seen Coach K in Detroit. But that’s just me,” Rose said.

Rose was an honor roll student in high school and is clearly well versed in cultural issues. But, he’s way off base in his assessment of Hill or any of Duke’s black athletes. Just because Hill grew up in affluence doesn’t reduce his level ethnicity or his standing in the black community. To call Hill an “Uncle Tom” is absolutely absurd.

Rose explains that his comment had nothing to do with being a racist. Basically, Rose said “it’s being somebody who is socially conscience and you’re paying attention to what’s going on around you.”

Certain schools recruit a certain kind of guy. That is a fact. But, again, a black player shouldn’t be called an “Uncle Tom” just because he joined a private school in Durham, N.C. It’s undeserving. When I was 17, I may not have been smartest kid on the block but I was smart enough to know that you don’t call a black kid an “Uncle Tom.”

The bottom line is this, Duke should be allowed to recruit its type of players as well as Michigan should be able to recruit its type of players. As much as Rose was correct in saying that Duke would not consider a player like him because of his background, he was wrong in bringing up the term “Uncle Tom.” Rose could have made his point just as clearly had he just said Duke recruited a bunch of rich kids.

Joel Huerto is the editor and publisher of OneManFastBreak.net. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/onemanfastbreak.