WATCH: Bill Self reveals halftime speech after historic national title comeback

Kansas Jayhawks coach Bill Self has won his second national title after a thrilling 72-69 victory against North Carolina on Saturday. Despite the Jayhawks turning the ball over up three points with 4.3 seconds remaining, Carolina’s Caleb Love miss a game-tying 3-pointer that helped complete the largest comeback in national championship history.

After entering halftime trailing 40-25, the Jayhawks got to work cutting down the deficit in the second half. They battled all the way back and eventually retook the lead with 10:23 remaining following a 3-pointer from Remy Martin. They carried that momentum the rest of the way to the victory.

In a postgame interview on TBS, Self explained the message he gave to his team at halftime that willed their second half comeback.

“I really didn’t say much,” Self said at the podium after the win. “We were disappointed in how we played in the first half. Carolina was obviously a much better team, but this team has been down before. I told them at halftime, ‘Would you rather be down 15 with 20 left or down nine with two left?’ Because that was obviously what happened in 2008. They all said, ‘Let’s take 15.’ So we played off of that.”

"I told them at halftime, would you rather be down 15 with 20 left or down 9 with 2 left?"

Bill Self recalls @KUHoops' #NationalChampionship run to fire his team up at half 🔥 pic.twitter.com/t04FrbxKYK

— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) April 5, 2022

The Jayhawks stormed back in emphatic fashion in the second half, stretching the Tar Heels to a 25-10 scoring start and tying the game at 50 thanks to an hard drive into the paint plus the foul for Big 12 Player of the Year Ochai Agbaji. Kansas didn’t let up, scoring the game’s next six points, setting the pace for an exciting finish.

Martin went on to make several other big plays, hitting another go-ahead 3-point shot with 2:39 remaining and coming up with a big-time block with 54 seconds left. The Kansas guard finished with an impressive 14 points on 4-for-6 shooting from beyond the arc off the bench in the win. Forward Jalen Wilson and David McCormack each finished with 15 points in the win.

With the victory, Bill Self is the only coach in the history of Kansas basketball to win more than one national title. He explained after the game what this feat means to him, particularly after losing his father this past year.

“It means that Kansas has won a fourth national championship is what it basically means. It’s great for the kids and it’s especially special for my family because we lost our father two months ago. So we had a lot to play for.”

On3’s Barkley Truax contributed to this report.