I'm dating myself for sure but does anybody else remember when - - just one team per conference got into the NCAA tournament? - when only the ACC had a conference tournament and the winner got that one NCAA bid, no matter how good the other teams were the rest of the season? Other things: - when "conference tournaments" were played right after Christmas and before the conference schedule and didn't win you anything but a trophy? - when the NCAA finally made the "big" leap to allow TWO teams per conference into the tournament? - when going to the NIT was a pretty big thing? I'm tempted to say "ah, those were the days", and it DID make the regular season and major conference tournaments extremely tense. But many really good and even great teams got left out of the tournament in those days. It's much better the way it is now.
Black Monday: The only two ACC entries in the tourney are highly regarded Carolina and Duke. Both lose in the first round. Carolina gets outhustled by Princeton while Duke (with Mike Gminski puking on the sidelines) loses to St. Johns.
Created by the top two team in the nation being Maryland and UNC (or was it Duke - and a Terp, I never remember) with the loser staying home. Confrence tournies were played before the regular season?!?
Maryland was probably the second best team in the country when they lost to NC State (with David Thompson - one of the best college players ever) in the 74 ACC final. The terps missed out on the NCAA's. Probably the impetus behind considering the acceptance of at large teams.
Re: Re: Does anybody else remember ... ? (NCAA stuff) I don't know if every conference had one, but I do know the Big 8 had a "holiday tournament" every year and I think the ACC had one, too, although now that I think about it, it may have just been the Big 4 schools (Duke, UNC, State and Wake). It was also a big thing for high schools to have holiday tourneys, at least where I grew up (in Missouri).
Re: Re: Re: Does anybody else remember ... ? (NCAA stuff) The Big Five in Philly still do this on a smaller scale, no?
Re: Re: Re: Does anybody else remember ... ? (NCAA stuff) You're right. It was just the Big Four (so-called, at the time). Now they've got the ACC Big 10 challenge of course.
Back to the topic ... when Dick Vitale promised to stand on his head if Austin Peay beat Illinois (I think) and then paid off on his promise when it happened. It's been all downhill for Vitale ever since.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Does anybody else remember ... ? (NCAA stuff) Actually, the Big Five is a unique case. It's not really a tournament but rather a separate competition (not affiliated with any conference) within the season in which the five teams play all the other teams over the course of the season. It's almost like a cup competition in soccer. Check out http://philadelphiabig5.ocsn.com
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Does anybody else remember ... ? (NCAA stuff) Yeah, the Big 5 is sweet. Its almost like those teams have two conferences -- the games are played with conference-like intensity. The '99 Penn/Temple game at the Palestra was insane. I'm not trying to derail this thread, but does anybody know why Drexel isn't an official member of the Big 5? Is it generally because they stink? Philly colleges also have an intracity soccer series called the Soccer 7. If memory serves, its the Big 5 schools plus Drexel and that long-named Textile school. Drexel had some decent teams when I lived there.
You guys, are like, soooo oooold. MY oldest memory is like, when micheal jordan came out of retirement for the eighth time and my great grandfather told me how he used to play college ball for THREE WHOLE YEARS before he went pro and I was like, what a lame-ass, no wonder he plays for the wizards now. And like my father told me he can even remember when you would throw up a fourty foot jumper and they'd only give you TWO POINTS. That is like so UNFAIR! My father also told me the refs used to let you dribble the ball around in circles all day long and they would never say anything because he said electricity had just been invented yet and they couldn't run the shotclock very long before the batteries went dead. But he also used to tell me he had santa claus locked up in the wood shed and would shoot him if I didn't start behaving myself so I don't know what to believe anymore.
Do you remember when players actually had to dribble, unlike today where almost every player has a killer cross-over because they're allowed to carry and palm the ball so much?
Ah, the memories, especially about the NIT being something to pay attention to. With Carolina in it this year, I'm following it for the first time since Cornbread Maxwell and UNCC!
I can remember Lew Alcindor playing for UCLA, so I remember a bunch of things, like 16 team fields, meaningful post-season NIT's, etc. Hell, I still count as one of the greatest sporting events I've ever seen a Missouri Valley Conference championship game between Creighton and Indiana State, one year after Bird left ISU, that was decided on a last second basket, after Creighton held the ball for the last shot... nearly 5 minutes. Won't see that again, thanks to the shot clock (it was great because ISU REALLY wanted that ball back, and Creighton REALLY wanted that shot). Of course, we won't see any more 17-12 games either, which makes the shot clock worthwhile.
... or 7-0 halftime scores (UNC at Duke, 1980). UNC stalled. Duke still scored those 7 points. UNC came out and played straight up in the second half. I think the final score was 47-40 (Duke). Some great strategy by Dean Smith ....
Score's right. I'm not saying (not me no not ever) that Dean was wrong then but Carolina did go on to beat that same Duke team later that season. 0-7 score was the final straw that brought on the shot clock. Dean's defense always was that the shot clock was set at 45 seconds, and on average Carolina took a shot at (I think) about every 30 seconds while it was running the 4 corners.
When they instituted the shot clock, I was actually hoping they would turn it off in the last 2-5 minutes (that seemed to be the time range suggested in the initial proposals). But that would've entailed players actually having to know how to play defense, and we can't have that. [/curmudgeon voice]
I was thinking about shot clock stuff this morning when I read a newspaper story about a MN state basketball tournament game that ended 33-22. The score at the end of the first quarter was 7-0.
Actually, it took another 6 years for the shot clock to get introduced. A second "final straw" came a couple of years later in what should've been a great showcase of college basketball - the 1982 UNC vs UVa ACC tournament final (Ralph Sampson vs Jordan, Worthy etc). The score was 34-31 UNC after a normal first-half but then UNC slowed it down in the second half, and the final score was 47-45, UNC. In that case, Dean was a genius. But it was the beginning of the end for the slowdown game. The shot clock was finally introduced in 1985-86 and the 3-point line the next season (although there were tests of both in various conferences - the most ridiculous was the 17-foot arc used by the ACC in 1982-83. Scores were regularly into the 100's all season!).
And without that arc, it's likely that NC St. doesn't win the ACC tournament, doesnt qualify for the NCAAs, etc.
Yeah, the Sydney Lowe and Derek Whittenberg senior backcourt just ate up that 17-foot arc. I forget which one of the two was hurt for much of the season and returned in time for the tournament to spark their run. They wouldn't have been quite as much of a Cinderella - ie their regular-season record would've been much better - without that critical injury.
I was going to suggest bringing back that short 3 point line. Then I remembered when the NBA brought their line in a few years ago. It was awful watching all these 7 footers clanking 3s, thinking they were the second coming of Craig Hodges...shudder... All you nostalgia-seekers should read this article: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sports/134655409_legends18.html
Good thread Sue. I still remember Maryland with Bozo Jim O'Brien and Howard White beating South Carolina 31-30 at Cole Field House. The two teams had a brawl when they played in SC and one of the SC players punched Lefty. Lefty got his revenge by slowing the game down and winning in the end. Back then, ACC tournament weekend was serious nervous time.