HOUSTON: Kris Jenkins overcame the shock of watching North Carolina’s Marcus Paige hit a double-clutch 3 to tie the scores by draining a 3 of his own at the buzzer to lift Villanova to a 77-74 victory and the national championship Monday night.

What a shot — and what a game.

The second-seeded Wildcats (35-5), had a six-point lead with 1:52 left, but watched it slowly trickle away. Then, it was gone, when Paige jumped — and when Ryan Arcidacono started running at him — double clutched and pumped one from beyond the arc to tie the game at 74 with 4.7 seconds left.

After a timeout, Arcidacono worked the ball up court and got it to Jenkins, who swished it from about two steps behind the 3-point line.

“I think every shot’s going in,” Jenkins said, “and this one was no different.”

The shot came on a play Villanova works on every day in practice: Jenkins inbounds the ball to Arcidiacono, he works it up court and forward Daniel Ochefu sets a pick near halfcourt to clutter things up, then Arcidiacono creates.

“I didn’t have to say anything in the huddle,” Villanova coach Jay Wright said. “We have a name for it, that’s what we’re going to do. Just put everybody in their spots.”

Jenkins finished with 14 points — the last three as memorable as any that have been scored in the history of this tournament. Arcidiacono finished with 16 points and two assists.

After being thrown to the floor by his teammates, Jenkins got up, leaped over the courtside media seats and hugged his mother — a college basketball coach who helped him hone his shot — and shouted, “They said we couldn’t, they said we couldn’t, they said we couldn’t.”

This adds to the title Villanova won in 1985, when Rollie Massimino, who was on hand Monday night, led his underdogs to a victory over star-studded Georgetown.

Paige finished with 21 and Joel Berry II had 20 for the Heels (33-7), the only No. 1 seed to make the Final Four. They came one agonizing shot short of giving Roy Williams his third national title.

Not surprisingly, the tears flowed from the 65-year-old coach who, some speculate, could have worked his last game on the sideline; the entire sports program at Chapel Hill is under NCAA scrutiny and awaiting possible penalties for a long-running academic-fraud case.

“I’m not very good because I can’t take away the hurt,” Williams said. “I told them I loved them. I told them I wish I could have helped them more.”