Heart of Blue
by
Caywood Ledford

To four great Kentucky basketball coaches and also great friends,
Adolph Rupp, Joe B. Hall, Eddie Sutton and Rick Pitino.

Introduction.

"What is important about a game is not the score but the people who
play it."

þRed Smith For 39 years I had the distinct privilege of being courtside
when the Kentucky Wildcats took the basketball court for combat.  I saw
team after team, player after player and four different coaches fashion
the Kentucky program into one of the best in all of college
basketball.

My first season as the broadcaster, in 1954, was the only undefeated
Kentucky team of the modern era.  Who could forget the 1958 team, the
Fiddlin' Five, who came out of obscurity to win the NCAA title.  Two
decades later a great UK team, which was to send four starters to the
pros, captured the big prize in 1978.

There were other teams who failed to win the game's biggest trophy but
were so long on courage and determination that they captured our
imagination.  The 1992 team, the Unforgettables, comes immediately to
mind.

Along the way, there were some great games ... games where it seemed
impossible to win but somehow the Cats pulled them out.

Even though my broadcasting career ended with the 1992 season, my
interest and affection for UK basketball did not.  In recalling my
favorite Wildcat memories, how could I fail to chronicle that
mind-blowing 31-point comeback to beat LSU or the incredible overtime
win over Arkansas in the 1995

SEC Tournament!

I hope you'll enjoy this trip back through the years as we remember
some great Kentucky basketball memories.

.e E The Coaches If any school has had four better basketball coaches
over the last half-century than the University of Kentucky, history
failed to record it.  Adolph Rupp, Joe B. Hall, Eddie Sutton and Rick
Pitino have guided the Wildcat fortunes with tremendous success.  In my
39 years as the UK broadcaster, I had the privilege of working closely
with these distinguished coaches.

I spent 19 years at the microphone while Coach Rupp was running the
show from the UK bench.  While I worked more years with Rupp than any
of the other three, I probably knew him less intimately.  Never in all
our years together did I call him anything but "Coach Rupp."  He was 52
years old when I began broadcasting the Wildcat games and he was
already at the very top of the coaching profession.  He had already won
three NCAA Championships (more than any other coach at the time) and in
1948, he had taken the Fabulous Five to the Olympic Games and won the
gold medal.

There is a picture of Coach Rupp in my office at home inscribed, "To my
best friend, with kindest regards for many years of working together,
Adolph F. Rupp."  While I was very flattered and proud of the
inscription, never did I think I was his best friend.

Rupp was a very private person.  I don't think he had very many

Adolph Rupp's bedside mamner included trying to tuck very tall Alex
Croza into a very small bed.

close friends, but he had many people he liked and enjoyed being around
and I like to think I fit in that group.  He was really a family man.

He just thought the world of his wife, Esther, and his son, Herky, and
when the grandchildren came along, he adored them.

Coach Rupp was the most punctual and the most frugal of the four
Kentucky coaches during my time near the program.  His long-time
assistant, Harry Lancaster, met with every incoming freshman class,
with the admonition to not only be on time but be early.  He said if
the coach said to be somewhere at 2 o'clock, be there at 1:45.  You had
to keep your watch synchronized if you were operating on Rupp's
schedule.

When he got on a bus, without even looking around, he uttered his order
to move with the words, - kiser doc."  More than once he left someone
in the traveling t often a player.  He ran his schedule with a military
precision.

14

Coach Rupp wasn't exactly a tightwad but he wasn't a spendthrift,
either.  He was close with a buck.  I always thought it was because he
grew up in Kansas during hard times.  His father died while Rupp was a
young boy and the entire family had to work hard and watch its money
carefully.  He grew up with a strong work ethic and a strong sense of
saving his money.

Of the four Kentucky coaches, Rupp was the best speaker hands down.

His speeches were very structured and he was a spellbinder from the
podium.

He was the best and most entertaining sports figure, as a public
speaker, I ever heard, and one of the best from any profession.

Coach Rupp had the greatest influence on me of the four coaches.

I was still in my 20s when I first met him and he was at the very
pinnacle of his coaching success.  He was my mentor and a person I
admired very much.

I learned a great deal from him.  He taught me how to set goals and
from him I learned the tremendous importance he attached to being well
prepared.  I just owe a lot to Coach Rupp.

If ever a man walked into a tougher coaching situation than Joe B.

Hall, I don't know his name.  Rupp had been at UK for 42 years and had
won more games than any coach in history.  He was forced out as coach
because he was 70 years old.  He went kicking and screaming.  During
his last season, he saw Hall as his only obstacle to keeping his job
and that year must have been pure hell for Joe.

To say that my l9-year association with Coach Rupp was the longest of
any UK coach is not entirely accurate.  Joe B. was on the coaching
staff for 20 years while I was the broadcaster but for his first seven
years, he served as an assistant coach and was gone much of the time
for recruiting and scouting trips.  I got to know him very well during
those seven years, but I didn't see him as often as I did Coach Rupp.

Hall had been a head coach at Regis College, in Denver, and at Central
Missouri State College when he agreed to join Rupp on the UK staff in
1965.  He had an immediate impact on the program.  Before he went into
coaching,Joe had been a salesman and it took one of his best efforts at
salesmanship to convince Rupp to install a preseason conditioning
program.  There were probably other reasons for the improvement, but
the team that had gone 15-10 the previous year, had a remarkable
turnaround with a 27-2

Melvin krpin was a big reason Joe B. Hall's 1984

Kentuclw team adwnced to the Final Four in Seattle.

16

: t : l X, f season and was runner-up for the NCAA Championship.

That team will always be known as "Rupp's Runts."

When Joe arrived at Kentucky he also discovered that recruiting was a
sort of "fly-by-the-seat-oœthe-pants" operation.  He carefully
organized a recruiting plan and in his first season, Joe brought in a
recruiting class of Dan Issel, Mike Pratt, Mike Casey, Jim Dinwiddie
and Terry Mills.  For the remainder of his tenure at Kentucky, Joe
constantly recruited excellent talent.  He also really is the man who
broke the color line for UK basketball.  He did recruit Tom Pyne in
1969 while Rupp was still the coach, but Pyne went to the pros after
one season as a Wildcat.  Joe B. is the man who brought in many fine
African-Americans under his watch as the head coach.

I got to know Hall while he was an assistant, but when he moved into
the top job replacing Rupp in 1972, I thought he really felt the
enormous pressure of the job.  A few years later after the legendary
John Wooden resigned, Joe said UCLA should hire him since he was the
only man in coaching experienced at following a legend.  He was.

Coach Hall is just now receiving the credit he deserves for his 13
years as the man at the helm of the Wildcats.  It was under Hall that
Kentucky won the 1978

NCAA Championship.  He took the Cats to two other Final Fours.  He won
the NIT when it was still a first-rate postseason tournament.  In 13
years, Joe brought back eight Southeastern Conference Championships to
add to UK's over-stuffed trophy case.  He truly had a remarkable run
as the Kentucky coach.

I first met Eddie Sutton at the 1978

Final Four in St.  Louis.

It was well-documented that Sutton had taken an Arkansas basketball
program that was close to non-existent and built it into one of the
strongest in the game.  When our paths first crossed, Eddie had brought
a fine team to St. Louis to meet Kentucky in the semifinals.  The Cats
won a hard-fought 6659 decision on their way to the championship.

I didn't see Sutton again until 1985, in Salt Lake City, and I was
surprised he remembered me.  Arkansas and Kentucky were among the four
teams assembled for the first and second rounds of the NCAA
Tournament.

I went out with UK for practice the day before the Cats were to meet
Washington.  Arkansas was just finishing its session as Kentucky was
preparing to take the floor.  Sutton called out to me and we had a
short, pleasant meeting.  His team lost the next night while Kentucky
won.

The Cats beat ,UNLV to advance to the regional.  I was to meet Eddie
Sutton again very soon, under very different circumstances.

Kentucky moved on to Denver but lost the first game against St.
John's.

After the game, Joe B. Hall announced his retirement as the Wildcat
coach.

The Final Four was held in Lexington that year and the nation's
basketball coaches always conveniently held their convention around the
big show.  It was during this carnival that UK Athletics Director
Cliff Hagan announced Sutton would be the new coach of the Wildcats.

I got to know Eddie well over the next four years.  He proved to be an
outstanding coach and he was very pleasant to work with.  He was the
first of the coaches I worked with who had a walk-through on the day of
the game.  Both Rupp and Hall had shoot-rounds where the team would
take shooting practice from the field and from the free throw line.

Sutton walked the team through the game plan and had them run their
out-of-bounds plays.  He also had them defense the out-of-bounds plays
he expected the opponent to run.  I confess I really enjoyed watching
these drills and the very relaxed attitude on game days.  After the
team completed its walk-through, on the road, he would have some kind
of a fun game among the assistant coaches, the media and the traveling
party.

We had contests from three-point range and we played games of "horse,"
but as the season wore on, our lack of talent reduced our competition
to free throw shooting.

Both Rupp and Hall were very guarded when discussing an op 18

!

Eddie Sutton helped Kentucky capture two SEC Tournament and two league
regular season titles in hisfouryears.

19 ponent on their pre-game radio program, but Sutton was more to the
point in his appraisal.  He would say that while anything could happen
in a game, Kentucky would win eight times out of 10 against a certain
team.

That was a new approach for a UK coach.

Joe B. certainly didn't leave the cupboard bare and Eddie took good
talent and did a masterful job with it.  His first season at Kentucky,
Sutton took the Wildcats to a 324 record that included both the SEC
championship and the SEC Tournament championship.  The Wildcats went to
Charlotte for the NCAA and posted easy wins over Davidson and Western
Kentucky to advance to the Southeast Regional at Atlanta.

The Southeast Regional resembled the SEC Tournament.  Kentucky, Alabama
and LSU were all in the field and, to win the championship and a trip
to the Final Four, Kentucky would have to beat both Alabama and LSU for
the fourth time that season.  The Wildcats defeated the Crimson Tide
but fell two points short against LSU, 59-57.  It was still a marvelous
season and, for his efforts in guiding the team, Sutton was named
national Coach of the Year.  I think you'll agree ... that was quite a
beginning for Eddie as the Wildcats' coach.

Sutton's second year was a rebuilding season as the Wildcats finished
with an 18-11 record.  The next year, Kentucky rebounded with a super
season and had a 234 record going into the NCAA Tournament that
included both the conference regular season and tournament titles.

Once there, the Cats won twice before a poor performance found them
losing to Villanova, 80-74.  Later, the NCAA was to wipe out UK's NCAA
Tournament record and the Southeastern Conference was to strip Kentucky
of both conference titles.

Only a few weeks after the season, in April, an Emery Air Freight
envelope spilled open on a conveyor belt.  Inside was $1,000.  The
envelope was addressed from Dwane Casey, one of Sutton's assistants, to
Claud Mills, father of top recruit Chris Mills.

The NCAA investigated Kentucky throughout the next season, 20

Pitino's uptempo style of play helped win the hearts of Catfans, and
also has helped Kentucky win a lot of games.

and it was a nightmare for everyone who cared about the UK program.

Kentucky finished the year with a 13-19 record, the first losing season
since 1927.  Sutton was forced to resign.  The happiest moment of the
season was when it was finally over.

The first time I ever saw Rick Pitino was at the 1987

Final Four in New Orleans.  I didn't get the chance to meet him but I
was very impressed with how confident and polished he was for a person
so young, as I sat in the audience at the media conferences.  I was
also impressed with his Providence team.  I hadn't seen the Friars play
but I knew they shot a lot of threes and I knew they had won a very
difficult regional to get to the Final Four.

I had been assigned to work a different regional, but I was well aware
of Rick's success in Louisville where his team manhandled an
outstanding Alabama teamþmaybe one of Wimp Sanderson's bestþand beat a
strong Georgetown team.  When I saw Providence lose to Syracuse in the
Final Four, I realized just what a great coaching job he had done
because the Friars simply did not have the great talent you normally
see at a Final Four.

Rick had moved on to the professional ranks with the NewYork Knicks
after the NCAA Tournament and I didn't see him again for two years.

He was in Lexington to look over C.M. Newton's offer to be the next UK
coach.  This time I did meet him.  I introduced myself and I'll admit I
was pleased that he knew who I was.  He told me he had listened to my
broadcasts many times while driving through New England on recruiting
trips.

I was very pleased when Pitino accepted the coaching job at Joe B. H"X
pointed the way for some very successful Kentucky teams, both as on
assisSnt under Rupp and as the Wildcats' head coach.

22

Kentucky.  The Wildcat program was at the lowest level almost anyone
could remember.  After the NCAA sanctions, the best players
transferred.

There would be no TV for a year and no postseason tournaments for two
years.  Only two starters were among the eight scholarship players that
would make up Pitino's first Kentucky team.  No player was taller than
S7.  C.M. Newton correctly said it was the poorest UK talent in half a
century.  I knew Pitino had taken down-and-out programs at other places
and built those teams into winners.  He would face his biggest
challenge to rebuild the Wildcats.

My last three years as the UK broadcaster, Pitino was the coach.

I got to know him quite well over that time and I must admit, they were
the most enjoyable three years of my 39 with the Wildcats.  To see him
take a down-and-out program and immediately guide it to over-achieving
was just great fun to be associated with.  I still think his
accomplishments border on a miracle.

I knew that the 1989-90 season, Rick's first at UK, was going to be a
bummer.  Even though an optimist, he felt he had only two players that
were capable of playing at Kentucky's level, Reggie Hanson and Derrick
iller.  The other six scholarship players he thought were back-up
players at best.  Ironically, four of those six became the nucleus of
the team that brought Kentucky back to basketball prominence.  They
were called the "Unforgettables."

When C.M. hired Pitino he gave him a seven-year contract.  Newton
thought the UK program was in such desperate straits that it would be
unreasonable to expect the new coach to rebuild the team on a standard
five-year contract.  Rick has worked wonders many times in his career,
but none was a bigger surprise than when he took his first UK team to
a 14-14 record.  Not even the biggest optimist, and that probably
includes "Mr. Optimism" himself, Rick Pitino, believed he could
accomplish so much so soon.

How did he do it?  It wasn't just the X's and O's.  His coaching
philosophy was revealed in his first season and it is a plan he follows
today.

23

To start with, he is the hardest working person I have ever been
around.  He comes to Memorial Coliseum in the wee hours of the morning
and stays until nine or 10 o'clock at night.  Rick has a strong work
ethic and he expects the same from his players.  His teams are always
in tremendous physical condition.  Kentucky often wins in the last 10
minutes of a game simply because the players are in better physical
condition than the opponents.  Pitino really gets to know his
playersþlearns what makes them tick.  His first season at UKhe brought
in Frank Gardner, a psychologist who had worked with the Knicks, to
test his team.  He learned Rupp was a master of game preparation, which
helped him become the all-time winningest coach in men's
basketball history.

which players needed prodding and which needed praise.  He understood
his players and how to deal with them as individuals.

Fans really don't get to know the coaches and there is a side to them
the public seldom sees.  in Pitino's case I think it is his
generosity.

He has given generously of his time and money to help his church, his
charities and his friends.  He is one of the most giving people I have
ever known.

Rick was a joy to work with.  He had a natural flair for huge crowds.

He is a very entertaining person, whether it's one-on-one or before a
large crowd.

The four coaches I worked with at the University of Kentucky had
different personalities but they shared a lot of philosophies when it
came to basketball.  Every single one of them was a driven
personþdriven to win.  They all had the fire in their belly when it
came to competition.

All four put great emphasis on defense.  They employed different
styles, but all of them really believed for a team to win it had to
start with good solid defense and each of them spent a lot of time in
practice stressing the defensive part of the game.

All four put great importance on scouting an opponent.  John Wooden,
who had such great success at UCLA, was fond of saying he worried about
his own team and didn't much care what an opponent did.  Coach Rupp
surely had to be one of the pioneers of scouting an adversary, and the
three men who followed him at UK all put great importance on finding
out anything and everything they could about every team on their
schedules.

I think that with the introduction of videotape most coaches today
really stress scouting their basketball enemies.

Rupp and Pitino favored the running game more than did Hall or
Sutton.

Joe B. did run more often than Sutton's teams but Rupp and Pitino liked
to see their teams race up and down the court.  Sutton's offense was
the most deliberate, requiring several passes before a player put up a
shot.

The three-point shot came into being after Rupp and Hall had 5 departed
but both Sutton and Pitino embraced the new rule with open arms.

Pitino's first UK team set a batch of national records with the
three-pointer but as his talent improved, Rick's teams did not fire
from behind the arc with as much frequency as his early Kentucky teams
did.

Hall and Pitino were the most active recruiters of the four UK
coaches.

Both of them logged a lot of miles seeking out talent and going into
the homes of the recruits.  Rupp and Sutton preferred to leave much of
the recruiting to their assistants.

Rupp was the most accessible of the UK coaches.  Despite all his fame
he never had an unlisted telephone number.  On a slow news day, you
could always get the Baron on the phone for an interview.

Rupp and Pitino were the most charismatic.  Each could enter a room and
immediately become the center of attention.  They were also the most
fun and most interesting to interview.  Both were very quotable and
each had a marvelous sense of humor.

I think I was close to all four Kentucky coaches.  I liked and
respected each of them and I believe they respected me.  I feel very
fortunate to have spent most of my adult life around men who were
winners and I like to think maybe a little rubbed off on me.

My strangest association was my last.  I spent only three years as the
broadcaster after Rick Pitino came to the Bluegrass, but I think we
developed a very special relationship.  I really can't explain it.

I'm old enough to be his father, but I think it was more of a
friendship that we had than a father-son relationship.  I think each of
us had a lot of respect for the other.  I know I have tremendous
respect for Rick both as a coach and a person.

We don't see each other nearly as often as we did while I was the
broadcaster, but when we do get together it's amazing to me we seem to
pick up right where we left off.

I enjoyed my association with all four of the UK coaches.  Coach Rupp
was my mentor,Joe B. was my friend, Eddie brought in new wrinkles to
the program, Pitino is always a breath of fresh air and, until the NCAA
imposed the 2Shour rule, worked the players 26

Sutton was one coach who was always willing to sit down and zwisit.

27 t I r Pitino receives a hugfroxn Mark PopefoBowing the Cats'
thrilling c(nneback win overArkansas in the 1995

SEC Tournaxnentfinal.

longer than the others.  Coach Rupp had the shortest practices.

Sutton brought the walk-through on game day and Pitino took that and
put it in fast forward, and sometimes, I thought the walkthrough was
actually a full practice on game day.

28

The four Kentucky coaches: Rupp, Hall, Sutton and Pitino were four very
different personalities.  But they all had one thing in common ...

they were driven to win and each of them could flat coach basketball.

29

/ The Perfect Season December 5, 1953, was a red-letter day for the
University of Kentucky basketball team and for me.  It marked the first
time the Wildcats had faced an opponent in 20 months.  It was also the
very first time that I sat at courtside to report the play-by-play
action of the Cats.

Kentucky had been suspended from playing the 1952-53 schedule.  UK was
one of seven schools implicated in the point-shaving scandal of the
late 1940s and, in a bitterly worded indictment handed down by Judge
Saul S.

Streit, he not only ruled that Kentucky players had taken money to
control the point spreads on games, but that Coach Adolph Rupp was a
party to subsidizing players illegally.

Rupp was to be proved innocent of charges that he had been involved in
gambling and of any manipulation to affect the outcome of a game.

University President Herman L. Donovan stood firmly in favor of Rupp at
a time when some were calling for Rupp to retire.

The point-shaving scandal had run its course by late summer of 1952,
but that October the Southeastern Conference came down hard on the
Wildcats, ruling that Kentucky would not be permitted to compete during
the 1952-53 season.

Kentucky was not able to play that season but there was nothing in the
ruling that prohibited the Cats from practicing.  The late Harry
Lancaster, an assistant to Rupp for 26 years, told me that he and Coach
Rupp decided to approach the season just as if they were going to play
a schedule and that they practiced every day, and they practiced
hard.

Harry said that Adolph had always been a driven man but that he "was
especially fired up that year."

Wildcat fans had to be content that winter to watch four intrasquad
games with Cliff Hagan on one team and Frank Ramsey on the other.

Gayle Rose, a member of that team, also remembers two games against the
professional Minneapolis Lakers in Memorial Coliseum before the start
of the season.  Gayle recalls that each team won a game and in the
Wildcat victory Hagan had a field day.  "The Lakers brought in the
great George Mikan," Rose said, "And Cliff was really fired up about
going against the big 6-10 center.  Mikan was considered the best
player in pro basketball at the time and even though he was six inches
taller than Clffl, Clfflwas quicker.  He completely outplayed Mikan in
that game."

The Southeastern Conference was first to ban Kentucky from league play,
but the NCAA followed suit by banning the Wildcats from all collegiate
action.  Rupp was especially bitter about the NCAA ruling and vowed
that he would never retire until the "bastards" who had suspended his
team handed him another championship trophy.

Harry Lancaster remembered the final day of practice in that long year
off.  He and Rupp were sitting in the coaches' dressing room for the
last time until the beginning of practice the next fall.  Harry
recalled that Rupp sat there on a bench in his starched khakis, just
staring at the wall in front of him for several minutes before turning
to Lancaster with the words, "Harry, by gawd, we're going to make those
bastards pay next year."

Memorial Coliseum was wild for that opening game December 5, 1953.

The fire marshall must have been looking the other way as every corner
was packed and, as the time came for the intro 32

Few opponents were able to stop a CliffHagan wok shot.

33 ductions, the crowd was on its feet screaming after every starter's
name was announced.  Rupp's friend and adversary, Harry Litwack, sat on
the bench in the south end zone (yes, the benches were located in the
end zones back then) as the starters for the Temple Owls were
introduced.

On the bench at the other end of the court, Adolph Rupp, dressed in his
trademark brown suit, sat with the Kentucky players.  The house lights
in Memorial Coliseum were dimmed and a single spotlight was focused
right in front of the Kentucky bench.  The public address announcer
called out the name of one starter, Cliff Hagan.

Cliff was listed as a senior, but actually had received his degree
during the suspended season and was in graduate school.  The Owensboro
native was 6-4 with an impressive physique.  Hagan was already an
All-American and had led the team in both scoring and rebounding during
the 1952 season.  Clffl had the sweetest hook shot I've ever seen and
he could hit that thing from 15 or 20 feet away from the basket.  He
also had a great shot from the corner where he could punish opponents
who elected to go to a zone.  Hagan was a scoring machine but not the
greatest defensive player who ever suited up in the blue and white.

He once told his teammate Frank Ramsey that, "nobody ever made
All-American playing defense."

The next player to step into the spotlight for his introduction was
Frank Ramsey.  Like Hagan, Frank was already in graduate school and had
already been named to the All-American team.  Number 30 was 6-3, tall
for a guard in those days, but he had great quickness and was a
slashing driver when going for the basket.  Frank was a very unselfish
player and Coach Rupp told me one time, "If we win by 30, Frank might
only get you three but if we win by three, Frank will get you 30."

I remember thinking that the name of the third senior would be called
next, but instead the announcer called for number 42, Billy Evans, a
6-1 starting forward.  He was a junior that season.

34

Billy was a natural athlete with excellent quickness and was just an
outstanding defensive player.  He was highly intelligent and could play
either forward or guard.

Next to step into the spotlight was Gayle Rose, a six-foot junior
guard.  Gayle was an outstanding ball handler and a fine passer.  He
could also hit the outside shot and was very good at starting the
offense.  He was one of the best dribblers I ever saw but Coach Rupp
didn't favor putting the ball on the floor very much.

The introduction of Lou Tsioropoulos completed the starting lineup.

Lou was 6-5, the tallest player in the starting lineup.  He had been an
outstanding football player at Lynn, Massachusetts.  Harry Lancaster
told me that Lou was actually on his way to Texas for an all-star
football game when he stopped off in Lexington for a tryout with the
basketball team.  They had just painted the floor in Alumni Gym and
Harry asked Paul "Bear" Bryant, who was holding spring football
practice, to take a look.

UK signed Lou on Bryant's recommendation.  Tsioropoulos was a very
hard-nosed player, just tough as hickory.  He was a strong rebounder,
and along with Billy Evans, the best defensive player on the team.

Lou, like Hagan and Ramsey, was already in graduate school.

Hagan, Ramsey and Tsioropoulos came to be known as "The Big Three" and
started every game that season.  Rose and Evans were to share starting
roles with two sophomores, Linville Puckett and Phil "Cookie"
Grawemeyer.

With Kentucky returning to action for the first time in almost two
years, emotions were sky-high for that Temple game in 1953.  The Owls
were expected to be a tough test for the Wildcats but such was not the
case.  With Hagan setting a Southeastern Conference scoring record with
51 points, the Cats raced to an easy victory, 86-59.

The Wildcats breezed through the first four games on their schedule
before the first University of Kentucky Invitational Tournament.

Rupp and Athletics Director Bernie Shively had conceived the idea of
the tournament and would invite three of the 35

The 195s54

Cats posted a perfect 254 mark under Rupp, the only time in his 42
years at Kentucky he coached an unbeaten team.

36 top teams in the country to join the Wildcats.  They came with an
elite field of Duke, La Salle and UCLA, and Kentucky was up to the
challenge, defeating La Salle and the great Tom Gola in the
championship game, 73-60.  La Salle was to go on that season to win the
NCAA Championship.

Kentucky was not only winning, but it was devastating the opposition.

The Cats came home from Knoxville with an easy win over Tennessee only
to be blind-sided with terrible news.  Larry Boeck had written in the
Cour7^er-Journal that the heart of the Kentucky team, Hagan, Ramsey and
Tsioropoulos would not be eligible to play in the NCAA Tournament
because they were graduate students.  The trio was eligible for the
regular season but not for the tournament.  UK officials were mad at
Boeck, but they should have known of the rule themselves.

It was a big blow, but if it distracted the Wildcats, they didn't show
it on the court.  That team kept right on rolling and when they laid
waste to Alabama on the road, the season was complete.  A perfect
24-0.

The SEC was made up of 12 teams then, just as it is now, but the league
was divided into thirds.  Kentucky was in the division with Tennessee,
Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech and played each of those teams twice (at
home and away) each season.  The Cats would go on the road to play four
of the teams while the other four came to Lexington for one game.

The SEC ruled that since Kentucky had not played the season before,
they would pick up the schedule just as if the Cats had played.

Grudgingly, Tulane, Mississippi and Mississippi State agreed to play
the Cats in Lexington but Louisiana State flatly refused, contending
that since Kentucky hadn't come to Baton Rouge the preceding season,
the Cats owed them a visit.

So when the 1954 season ended with both Kentucky and LSU undefeated in
conference play, the SEC decreed they would meet in a playoff game at
Vanderbilt in Nashville for the league title and the right to represent
the SEC in the NCAA Tournament.

Coach Rupp had been experiencing health problems through 37 much of the
season.  He had an eye infection during the campaign and had to wear a
patch.  On the way to Montgomery, Alabama, late in the season to play
Auburn, Rupp suffered chest pains and had to see a doctor.

He spent much of the week before the game with LSU confined to his
home.  He and Lancaster made plans to stop LSU and its great star, Bob
Pettit.

Pettit had led the SEC in scoring for three straight years.  He came
into the playoff game with Kentucky averaging more than 31 points and
17 rebounds a game.  Obviously, stopping Pettit, or at least slowing
him down, had to figure uppermost in Rupp's game plan.  He decided to
play it straight with the guards meeting the LSU guards at midcourt and
exerting extreme man-to-man pressure on them.  This was an effort to
keep the ball out of Pettit's hands.  Tsioropoulos, who always drew the
defensive assignment on the opponent's best inside player, would take
on the big LSU center.

It was an unbelievably warm day for so early in March as Kentucky
looked to the playoff game with LSU.  It was actually shirt sleeve
weather as Harry Lancaster led the players onto the chartered bus in
front of the Noel Hotel in downtown Nashville for the ride to Memorial
Gym on the Vanderbilt campus and the date with destiny.  Coach Rupp was
still in his hotel room under a doctor's care after what was described
as a mild heart attack earlier in the day.  He was ordered to stay in
bed all day but Adolph Rupp was one tough human and just before the
tip-off here he came, leaning on the arm of Athletics Director Bernie
Shively.

His instructions to the team were to play tough, hard man-to-man
defense, get out on the fast break as often they could and for all five
men to crash the boards after every shot because LSU was so much
bigger.

Then the Cats went to war with LSU and the great Bob Pettit.

A war it was, but Kentucky held a four-point lead, 32-28, at the
half.

The college game was played in four 10-minute quarters in those days
and LSU got it going in the third stanza.  The Tigers pulled ahead,
40-36, and Kentucky called a timeout.  Shively helped Rupp to his feet
and Ramsey told me later that Rupp said, 38

"By gawd we're beat," but that Lancaster told him to go to a fullcourt
press.

The score was tied at the end of three quarters, 46-46.  Hagan and
Ramsey began to take over the game and Coach Rupp sent Rose in for
Puckett with instructions to "slow it down."  What I saw over the next
few minutes was something I had not seen all season, nor did I see
again over the next 18 years that Rupp was the coach.  Rose put on the
most awesome dribbling display you could imagine.  I mean it was
straight out of the Harlem Globetrotters, the best ball handling and
dribbling team in basketball.

Coach Rupp despised the dribble and I was shocked to see him send in
Rose with instructions to put on a dribbling act just to kill the
clock.

"Coach Rupp didn't tell me to dribble," Gayle told me recently.

"He just told me to slow the game down but I just did it
automatically."

Gayle said that when he played for his brother, Jimmy, at Paris, he
often put the ball in the deep freeze with his dribbling.  He recalled
that he once dribbled a whole quarter against Brooksville.  Even though
Rose's dribbling act saved the day against LSU, he was to go the rest
of his career at Kentucky without Coach Rupp giving him the green light
to repeat his performance.

When the final horn sounded, Kentucky had beaten LSU by seven, 63-56.

Rupp's description of Frank Ramsey being at his best in the big games
was right on the money, as Ramsey led all scorers with 30.  Hagan
scored 17 while Tsioropoulos held Pettit to 17, which was barely more
than half his average.

In the dressing room, the Kentucky players were whooping it up.

They had given Coach Rupp his first undefeated season, a perfect
25-0.

They had won the Southeastern Conference championship and had earned
the right to represent the league in the NCAA Tournament.  Rupp asked
the players if they still wanted t,o go to the Tournament without the
three stars.  Ramsey, Hagan and Tsioropoulos argued against it, feeling
the team could not win without them and that it would blemish the
team's perfect record.

Frank Ramsey (above) teamed with Lou Tsiompoulos and
Cliff Hagan to form Kentucky's "Big Three" in the 1953-54 season.

40

Still, when the vote came, it was 9-3 in favor of going.  Nobody ever
accused Rupp of running a democracy in his program and he quickly
overturned the vote.  He informed the team that since Hagan, Ramsey and
Tsioropoulos had brought them through the season undefeated the team
was not going.  Ramsey told me that their coach said, "I'm not going to
take a bunch of turds like you to the NCAA."

Gayle Rose recalled that after Rupp's decision he was in the shower
when somebody came in to tell him, since the team would not be going to
the Tournament, the top players would get their jerseys retired.

That took some of the sting out of not going.  Seven jerseys that were
worn by those players now hang in Rupp Arena, more than from any other
team.

When Rupp left the arena, there was a taxi waiting and with Shively
still helping the ailing Rupp, the two men left, with a police escort,
for the hotel.

After showering and dressing, Hagan, Ramsey and Tsioropoulos decided to
head back to the Noel Hotel to check on their coach.  Rupp was in bed,
but in a talkative mood.  The three players asked their coach how he
accounted for that fabulous undefeated season and Ramsey said Rupp
quickly answered, "Hell, superior coaching."

The 1953-54 team was the only undefeated team in Rupp's 42 years at
Kentucky.  It was truly a great team, winning by an average of more
than 27 points a game.  But in a way, it was an unfulfilling season.

Rupp had vowed that the people who handed down the suspension would one
day hand him the championship trophy.  It would come, but the Baron
would have to wait another four years.

The Fiddlin' Five It doesn't matter what Vernon Hatton accomplished as
a Kentucky basketball player, his name has become a part of the Wildcat
mystique for just one shot in his career.

Never mind that he scored more than a thousand points.  Never mind that
he was named to the All-American team or led the Wildcats to the NCAA
Championship.  Vernon Hatton will always be known as the player who hit
"The Shot."

"Everywhere I go in Kentucky, people still want to talk about that
shot," Vernon said, and that was back in 1957.  It was 48 feet, 10
inches, but it gets longer every year."

The game took place on December 7, 1957, in Memorial Coliseum.

Harry Litwack brought in an outstanding Temple team headed by
All-American Guy Rodgers.  It turned out to be one of the most exciting
games in Kentucky's rich history.

The score was tied at regulation's end, and in the first overtime
Kentucky trailed by two points with only one second left on the
clock.

With the ball at midcourt, Rupp signaled for a timeout.  Sensing that
the cause was hopeless, the crowd began dashing for the exits to get an
early start on the traffic.  It was during those 60 seconds that the
plot was hatched for Hatton's heroics.

"Right before the end of the regulation game, Adrian Smith 43 was asked
to shoot from the outside," Hatton remembered, "and he shot an
airball.

In the huddle Coach Rupp said, Smitty, you've got to try it again, but
make it this time."  Assistant Coach Harry Lancaster asked Rupp to let
Hatton take the shot.  I heard him say that and I said Yeah Coach, let
me take it."

" John Crigler took the ball out of bounds at midcourt as Hatton
aligned himself with the basket.  The pass came to Hatton, and in one
motion, he fired a two-handed set shot.  The horn sounded while the
ball was in the air.  It hit nothing but net to send the game into the
another overtime.

Nothing was decided in the second extra period, as it ended with the
score tied at 75.

As the third overtime session played out, the crowd who had left during
the timeout before Hatton's shot, began to file back into Memorial
Coliseum.  The place was packed once again as Kentucky went on to win
over Temple, 85-83.

To dismiss the 1957-58 season with Hatton's shot from downtown
Lexington would be a mistake.  That team was to write one of the real
Cinderella stories in UK basketball history.

Pressure was beginning to mount on Adolph Rupp.  It had been six years
since he had won his third NCAA title, and some in Wildcat land thought
the old man had lost his touch.  Preseason practice gave Rupp no
thought that this Wildcat team might change that.  He saw ahead one of
the toughest schedules in years.  He spoke of what he called a Carnegie
Hall schedule and, in his own colorful language, said, "We've got
fiddlers, that's all.  They're pretty good fiddlersþbe right
entertaining at a barn dance.  But I'll tell you, you need violinists
to play at Carnegie Hall.

We don't have any violinists."

Rupp had four starters back from a team that had gone 23-5 the season
before and made an early exit from the NCAA Tournament.  Apparently the
press agreed with Rupp that his players weren't violinists.  Not one
was chosen to the preseason All-American team.  But then, 1958 was a
true banner year for great college talent.  Kansas had Wilt "the Stilt"
Chamberlain.  Cincinnati had 44

Vernon Hatton wiX be rememberedfor his shotfom near midcourt that
helped Kentucly hock off Temple in triple overtime.

All smiles here, Adolph R7zpp and Johntry Cox were two of thefiercest
competitors ever to be associated with W"ldcat basketball.

Oscar "The Big O" Robertson.  There was the magnificent Jerry West at
West Virginia, Elgin Baylor at Seattle, Guy Rodgers at Temple and Tom
Hawkins at Notre Dame.

The Kentucky team was led by 6-3 senior guard Vernon Hatton.

46

Hatton, to me, was one of the greatest clutch players to ever wear the
blue and white.  He could win games.  Vernon was an incredible player
when he had the ball in his hands with the game on the line.  Harry
Lancaster, who was Rupp's assistant on that team, said of Hatton, "If I
had to put a man on the free throw line and my life depended on whether
he made it or not, Vernon Hatton is the man I'd want to shoot it."

Johnny Cox was the only junior in the starting lineup.  He was a 6-4
forward and skinny as a rail.  He had the best outside shot on the team
and could hook it in with either hand in close to the basket.

Johnny was frail, but there has never been a more fierce competitor.

Because of his lack of bulk, Cox took a beating, but he was always up
to it and actually gave more than he took.  John Crigler was the other
forward at 6-3.  He was a senior, and even though he was not a very
good shooter from the perimeter, Crigler was the best driver on the
team and was third in scoring behind Hatton and Cox.  Crigler had good
quickness and was an outstanding defensive player.

Ed Beck was the starting center.  The 6-7 senior had the lowest scoring
average among the starters, but he was a tremendous rebounder and
defensive player.  Beck was highly intelligent and seldom made a
turnover.  He was strong and could really set a screen.

Adrian "Odie" Smith was also a senior, but only in his second year as a
Wildcat.  He came out of the junior college ranks and was probably
intimidated to some extent by the others who had been together for so
long.  Smith was an excellent outside shooter and usually started the
plays from his guard position.  He was certainly underrated at Kentucky
as he proved through a long and successful career in the NBA.  Harry
Lancaster said it was the closest-knit team during his 26 years as
Rupp's assistant.  Vernon Hatton agreed they were close and totally
unselfish.  "We didn't care who scored.  Cox and I usually were the
leading scorers but it didn't make any difference," Hatton said.

"Everybody was capable of scoring and everybody had a big night during
the year.  But we 47

The Fiddlin' Five capped the 1957-58 season by upsetting Seattle, 8472,
to win the naimal championship.

were role players and everybody knew his role."

In 1958, only 24 teams made it into the NCAA field and for Kentucky to
qualify, the Wildcats had to win the last game on their schedule
against Tennessee in Knoxville.  Kentucky won by 11, outscoring the
Volunteers 77-66.  Still, UK had lost six games and no team had ever
won the NCAA Championship with that many 48 defeats.  Vernon Hatton
contends that Kentucky's 19-6 regular-season record was very
deceiving.

"Only one of our losses came at home, and that was to West Virginia
and Jerry West.  Half of our six losses, three of them, were by only one
point," he says.  True.  One of those one-point defeats came at the
hands of Loyola of Chicago in Chicago.  Right at the end of the game
the Ramblers got an easy run-out on Kentucky and the shot at the buzzer
gave them a 57-56 decision.  Rupp was livid.

Back in Lexington the next night on his television show, Rupp 49 told
me that his team had not played smart basketball.  "We're just not a
smart team," he told me.  "When they hand out the Phi Beta Kappa keys
at the end of the season, I don't think there'll be any dangling from
our boys' watch chains."

Still, Kentucky made it to the big dance, and two very fortunate things
were in its favor.  The fiddlers were playing their sweetest music of
the season, and even though they still weren't in Carnegie Hall, it was
better.  The Wildcats would play the Mideast Regional on their home
court in Memorial Coliseum.

The Wildcats were hitting on all cylinders in their first tournament
game, burying a good Miami of Ohio team, 94-70.

Despite enjoying a home-court advantage, Kentucky was a decided
underdog the next night against Notre Dame.  The Irish had one of the
premier players in the college game in Tom Hawkins and the night
before, against Indiana, Hawkins had ripped the nets for 31 points.

Harry Lancaster later remembered that game.  "Everyone thought Adolph
used the zone defense for the first time in his life several years
later," he said, abut we came awfully close to one that night."  The
UK strategy was to station Beck right behind Hawkins and to drop Smith
back in front of the Notre Dame All-American.  It worked to
perfection.

Hawkins scored only 15 points and the Wildcats raced to a surprisingly
easy 89-56 win.

The fiddlers only had to travel 80 miles for the Final Four.

Louisville's Freedom Hall might not have been Carnegie Hall, but it was
the most palatial arena in college basketball.  The Wildcats would face
their old friends from Temple in the first semifinal.

"Temple had a heck of a team," Hatton told me.  "They were highly
ranked and they had lost only two games.  After we won that triple
overtime game, they lost to Cincinnati, who had the great Oscar
Robertson.

We knew we were in for a tough game."

It was a tough game from start to finish.  Nip and tuck.  With 24
seconds to play, Temple led 60-59 when Rupp signaled for a timeout.  He
told the team it would work for a shot from about 10 feet out to be
taken by either Hatton or Smith.  Beck suggested a diff

Johnny Cox was the only junior starter on the fabled Fiddlin' Five.

erent play.  The UK center felt that Hatton could drive off Beck's
screen and that Vernon might get open for a layup.  He convinced Rupp
it would work.  "All right," Rupp told the group, "forget what I told
you then and let's go with Beck's play."  Hatton remembered that play
Beck had recommended.  "Ed Beck came out for me and set a screen on my
man, and I drove for the basket.  I was going to shoot going in but
Temple players were all over me.  I went on by the basket and flipped
it in and there were still about 16 seconds left."  Hatton said the
team was very concerned, with that much time, that either Rodgers or
Temple's outstanding sophomore, Bill "Pickles" Kennedy, would nail a
jump shot.

Their fears were unfounded.  Kennedy bobbled the ball out of bounds and
Kentucky held on to win, 61-60.

Rupp allowed his team to watch the first half of the other semifinal
between Kansas State and Seattle.  Kansas State came to the Final Four
favored but, in a hotly contested first half, Seattle led 37-32.

Rupp was spared what he would face the next night by his departure with
the team during the intermission.  Elgin Baylor put on the greatest
one-man show I ever saw.  He blocked shots.  He threw behind the back
passes.

He just did everything a player could do and he personally destroyed
Kansas State, 73-51.  If I was impressed, Lancaster and Baldy Gilb,
scouting Seattle from press row, were even more in awe of Seattle and
the great Baylor.

Lancaster went to Rupp's room after the game to inform his boss that he
had no scouting report.  "There's no way we can beat them," he told
Rupp.

Rupp and Lancaster had failed to come up with a comprehensive game plan
when they met with the players at lunch in the Seelbach Hotel.  Then
came an unexpected miracle.

Rupp later told of the man coming to his room with a plan to beat
Seattle.  He never revealed the name of the mysterious visitor but
after Rupp's death, Lancaster revealed that the mystery man was John
Grayson, the coach at Idaho.  He brought along a huge roll of film and
the advice that was to help the Wildcats spring a 52

Vernon Hatton scored 30 points in the 1958

NCAA title game to help Rupp win his fourth NCAA championship.

monumental upset.  "To beat Seattle," he said, "you must convince your
kids that they can't stand there and watch Baylor play.  He mesmerizes
the other team."  Then Grayson started the film and pointed out Baylor
had difficulty guarding a player who would drive on him.  He felt if
Kentucky could get Baylor in foul trouble they could beat Seattle.

"Wake these kids 30 minutes early," Rupp told Lancaster.  "We'll give
them this new scouting report."

Rupp expected Baylor to guard Beck, UK's low-scoring center.

Seattle coach John Castellani had scouted Kentucky in the Temple game
and noticed that Crigler had a so-so game.  He decided to put Baylor on
Crigler.

Rupp was surprised and delighted and he ordered Crigler to drive and
drive on the Seattle star.  Baylor picked up three early fouls, and
after he was switched to guard the centers Beck and Don Mills, he
picked up his fourth foul trying to guard Mills' hook shot.  With
Baylor rendered ineffective defensively, Hatton slashed for 30 points,
and with Cox's pinpoint accuracy from long range netting him 24 points,
the Wildcats dashed to a huge upset, 84-72.

Rupp had won his fourth NCAA Championship.  The other three had been no
surprise, but it was an unexpected accomplishment for the fiddlers.

At the post-season banquet he said: "These boys are still just a bunch
of barnyard fiddlers, but they sure can fiddle!"

54

Sweeter Than Sugar X .

.

Adolph Frederick Rupp could be a man of great charm or a man who could
hand out a tongue lashing unequalled in the free world.  I doubt that a
Kentucky player, during Rupp's 42 years as the coach, escaped the wrath
of his temper.  Rupp did not confine his anger entirely to his players,
and would turn on a member of the media if he disliked something that
had been written or said .  about him or his program.  In the 19 years
that I was the broadcaster during his career, he read me what he
liked to call "the riot act" only once.

t Shortly before 6 p.m. on January 14, 1963, the phone rang in g the
sports department of WHAS in Louisville.  The voice on the other end
said, "Cawood, this is Adolph Rupp.  I'm damned disappointed in
you.  I heard that you had on your broadcast the news t.

that we were are going to play in the Sugar Bowl Tournament next 0
season.  Did you say that?"

I tried to explain that I had simply broken a story that I had ths
covered on my own but he was having none of that.  Rupp insisted I had
broken a confidence, that I had betrayed our friendship and that I had
embarrassed him by breaking the story prematurely.

Kentucky had beaten LSU in Baton Rouge and had moved on to New Orleans
to play Tulane, which was in the Southeastern 55

Conference then.  I ran into Charlie Thornton in the lobby of the Jung
Hotel and we went to the coffee shop for some conversation and
coffee.

Charlie was the Sports Information Director at Tulane at the time and
he told me that the Sugar Bowl officials were up in Rupp's room at that
moment signing a contract for Kentucky to play in the tournament the
next December.  Of course Charlie extracted a promise that his name
would not be used if I decided to do the story.

That's what happened, and Coach Rupp was mad as hell.  He was never a
man to hold a grudge.  After he blew his top, the matter was closed.

It had long since been forgotten when the team checked into New
Orleans, in December, for the 1963

Sugar Bowl Tournament.

Kentucky was going through a recruiting drought in those days,
especially recruiting the high-profile out-oœstate players.  Four
native sons started on that 1963-64 team, with Cotton Nash the lone
exception.

But what an exception.

I first saw Charles "Cotton" Nash "Jeffersonville, Indiana, just
across the Ohio River from Louisville.  Jeff had one of the best high
school teams in Indiana and Cotton was the best player on a team that
saw all five starters earn major college scholarships.  Cliff Barker, a
member of the Kentucky Fabulous Five in the late 40s, was
the Jeffersonville coach.  Nash was a sophomore on that team and it was
to be his one and only varsity season at Jeffersonville.  His father,
Frank, worked for Dupont and was frequently transferred around the
country.

After the 1957 season, Frank moved to Texas, and Cotton played his
final two seasons across the state line in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Barker had alerted his two former coachesþAdolph Rupp and Harry
Lancasterþthat they should keep an eye on Nash as a possible recruit
for the Wildcats.  "Harry called a lot," Nash said, "and he came to
Lake Charles.  Coach Rupp also came to see me my senior year.  But the
biggest pursuer by far was UCLA.  I got a call every night from either
Coach (John) Wooden or his assistant, 56

Despite his 6-3frame, La?ny Conley was a great leaper and rebounder
Jisr KentucFy in the mid-1960s.

57

Jerry Norman."  Visitations were not limited in those days and UCLA had
Nash out to the coast on two occasions.  Cotton remembered his second
visit.  "I had seen a basketball movie, Tall Story," which featured a
budding actress named Jane Fonda.  I kinda had a crush on her and I
mentioned this on my visit.  They promised me a date with her if I came
to school there."  Cotton never did get around to that date because he
signed with Kentucky the August after his senior year.

Nash was at Kentucky in an era Harry Lancaster termed the "lean
years."

The Wildcats were still getting the good home state players but most of
the top talent in the other parts of the country was going elsewhere.

The 1963-64 season got underway with Kentucky reeling off eight
successive wins.  After defeating Notre Dame in Louisville by 20
points, the Wildcats headed for New Orleans and their first Sugar Bowl
Tournament in seven years.

Nash was the tallest starter at 6-5.  He was a magnificent athlete who
had excelled in football and baseball as well as basketball.  He was
exceptionally small for a center, but he had such great overall skills
that he could have played any position on the team.  It was his senior
season and "King Cotton" had already been named to the All-Conference
and All-American teams two years in a row.

Senior Ted Deeken and sophomore Larry Conley were the starting
forwards.  Each stood just 6-3 and each was frail in stature.  Despite
lacking height, both players were excellent rebounders.  Both were good
shooters.  Conley had a variety of shots while Deeken specialized in a
hook shot.  Deeken was from Louisville and Conley called Ashland
home.

Two other native sons started at guard.  Harrodsburg's Terry Mobley
operated at one of the backcourt positions while Owensboro's Randy
Embry started at the other.  Mobley was 6-2 and Embry was 5-11.  Both
were juniors.

It was one of the shortest starting fives in U.K's modern basketball
history.

With Nash firing in 28 points, Kentucky easily erased Loyola of 58

New Orleans on the first night of the Sugar Bowl Tournament to set up a
game with Duke for the championship.

The title game was on NewYear's Eve, December 31, 1963.  The biggest
snow storm to hit New Orleans in years fell on the city.  Power lines
were down.  Traffic was slowed to a crawl and there were accidents all
over the city.  The championship game was delayed for more than an hour
to get the lights on in the Loyola Field House.  While workers were
successful with the lights, the heat system wasn't working and the game
was played in a very cold arena.  I remember that I did the entire
broadcast in my overcoat.  Terry Mobley recalled that Coach Rupp told
the players to keep their warmups on right up until the start of the
game.

Duke was a very large and talented team.  Coach Vic Bubas started a
pair of 6-10 players inside, Jay Buckley and Hack Tison.  Jeff Mullins,
a 6-4 guard, was the team's leading scorer.  Mullins was from Lexington
and Kentucky had waged a determined effort to recruit the hometown
product, but Duke won out in the end.

Rupp told his players that, because of the great height advantage the
Blue Devils enjoyed, the best chance for the Cats would be to make it a
running game and attempt to tire Duke's big men.  He also stressed the
importance of blocking out in order to compensate for the rebounding
edge held by Duke.

All the Kentucky players made major contributions in the game.

Conley scored the first four points for the Wildcats and made several
steals.

Mobley was given the difficult assignment of guarding Mullins, the Duke
star.  Nash and Deeken, giving away a tremendous height advantage to
Duke's pair of 6-10 inside players, would have to play the game of
their lives.  All of them were up to the task.

The game was close in the early going with the lead changing hands four
times.  First one team would get a short lead, then the other would
move ahead by a few points.  After Embry's shot from the corner tied
the score at 13-13, Duke began to dominate.  The Blue Devils led 47-35
with 10 seconds left in the first half when 59

Kentucky won the 1963

Sugar Bowl Tournament title behind the outstanding play of the event's
most valuable player, Cotton Nash.

60

Mobley hit his first field goal of the tournament to cut Duke's
halftime lead to 10, 47-37.

Mobley said that, in the locker room at halftime, Coach Rupp gave them
a good chewing-out before turning it over to Lancaster.  "Coach
Lancaster told us to feed the ball to Cotton in the second half,"
Mobley said.

"Cotton was having one of his big games.  As I recall, he said, While
we may not be able to guard their two big kids, it's for darn sure they
sure as heck can't guard Cotton."  So we went out in the second half to
run our plays in an effort to get the ball in Cotton's hands."

The Cats began to slowly chip away at the Duke lead and with 7:07 to
play, Nash hit a long jump shot to tie the score at 70.  Deeken was
having a big second half for the Cats and his hook shot pushed Kentucky
in front for the first time since early in the game, 72-70.

Buckley hit one of two free throws to cut the Kentucky lead to one, and
when the Cats got the rebound, they called timeout with exactly five
minutes remaining.  Kentucky worked the ball to Deeken, and again he
hit a short hook shot to push the Cats ahead, 74-71.  Buckley returned
the favor at the other end to cut the margin to one, 74-73.  Nash,
playing one of his greatest games as a Wildcat, outmaneuvered the big
Duke front line for a layup.  That gave him 30 points for the game and
gave Kentucky a 76-73 lead.  Tison scored for Duke to make it 76-75.

Embry's free throw with 3:41 remaining in the game made it 77-75.

Now it was Duke's turn to rally.  Each of the Duke giants, Buckley and
Tison, made a close-in field goal to push the Blue Devils ahead by two,
79-77.  Only 1:38 remained.  Terry Mobley was about to have a game that
he would remember the rest of his life.

Larry Conley had fouled out midway through the second half and another
sophomore, Tommy Kron, had come on to take his place.  Two years later,
the two would be the heart of a great Kentucky team called "Rupp's
Runts."  Kron wasn't waiting for that.  He got his chance in that Sugar
Bowl Tournament and turned in an excellent performance.  He was
assigned to guard Mullins and really shut him down toward the end of
the game.

With the Cats trailing Duke 79-77, Kentucky got a fast break going.

Kron was bringing it down the middle of the floor and saw Mobley
running the right wing.  He got Terry the ball and Mobley hit a
12-footjump shot to knot the count 79-79.  There was still 1:29 left to
play.

Duke called timeout with 59 seconds to go, and Bubas told his team to
work the ball around for a good shot, getting it into the hands of
Mullins, Tison or Buckley.  Perhaps the Blue Devils were being too
cautious.  Deeken slapped the ball out of the hands of Duke's Tison and
Kron grabbed the loose ball.  There were 47 seconds left in the game.

Kentucky called a timeout.

"Coach Rupp designed this play that would get me the ball," Nash
recalled recently.  "I was having a good game and everybody in the gym
knew I would take the last shot.  When we went back out, Duke put three
men on me and there was no way I could get the ball."

Embry and Kron were more successful at killing the clock than Duke had
been, and they worked the clock down to 12 seconds before passing the
ball to Mobley who would feed it into Nash.  "Everybody knew we were
going to Cotton," Mobley said.  "They were sagging all over him and
time was running out.  I had no choice but to shoot the ball, and
fortunately it went in."  Terry was about 15 feet out and slightly to
the right of the key.  The shot hit the board and banked into the net
and Kentucky had beaten Duke, 81-79.  Was Mobley the designated
shooter?  "Oh, hell no," he laughed.

The crowd in Loyola Field House was a very partisan Kentucky crowd and
the fans flowed onto the floor to celebrate a remarkable Kentucky
win.

Nash had scored 58 points in the two-day event and was named the MVP
for the Tournament.  Oddly, he almost didn't play in it.

Nash's family had moved to Massachusetts, as his father had Randy
Embry's excellent guard play helped the Cats to a 21-6 record during
the 1963-64 season.

d again Frank N"Sh had take i ville for the Notre Dame g
f the Sugar BoWL He brþUg The players Could get as many w d Nash went
to Rupp s room h Rupp and told him I wanted Y d H told me he didn t have
any Other father and sister, wh h setts He insisted he didn't the wrong
way and I said i,f Y Xt going either.  I told him I i movie."  he was
serious about not Playing l d?  I went back to my room two hours later,
HarrY LanCa el sternly and handed in d d left without saying a word h
oacheS and they never me b t gObley was the star of the g d the
difference- He rememb d elebratiþn after the game, PP t late him.  He
put his arm l orked didn't it, bUddY?  I sa b tween you and me, everYbþ
Y d I told you to shot- I saidv Iked off the flOor coach Rupp y and
wesre going to stick to h membered reading in the h t coach Rupp had
anticiPate d had told gObley to take th l ghed "I just couldn t get C
id that winning the Sugar BoW h t the players were more ex out and
Kentucky was ra "SiOs to smile as Larry Cone pt red the 1964

SEC championship had been yearS since KentUcky re proud to get the prþgram
belonged 65

Kentucky went on to win the Southeastern Conference championship, but
bombed out in the 1964

NCAA Tournament.

Duke had the last laugh.  The Blue Devils made it to the final game of
the NCAA Tournament before losing to UCLA.  It was the first of 10
national championships for John Wooden.

66

_ '.

W Revenge Against the Hoosiers A basketball play-by-play announcer, so
I'm told, should not get emotionally involved with the team he is
covering.  I've never bought into that theory.  I have always believed
that if a person followed one team over a number of years and didn't
care whether it won or lost, that person was in the wrong line of
work.

For 39 years, I felt the pain when the Cats lost and the thrill of
watching them win.

December 7, 1974, was a very painful night.  After two wins to start
the season, the Cats headed to Bloomington for their annual date with
Indiana.  Kentucky not only lost to the Hoosiers, Kentucky was
embarrassed.  As we rode out of town, I remember sitting there in the
car thinking, "This is going to be a long winter."

This was the senior year for a group of players Joe B. Hall had
recruited.  As a freshman team, they had gone 22-0 and been dubbed the
"Super Kittens."  Kevin Grevey, Jimmy Dan Conner, Mike Flynn and Bob
Guyette were starters as seniors.  During their junior year, they
posted a 13-13 record, the worst in Hall's 13 years as the Kentucky
head coach.

In 1974, as seniors, the former "Super Kittens" were joined by another
great recruiting class of Jack Givens, Mike Phillips, Rick Robey and
James Lee.  A rules change now allowed freshmen to 67

Kent Benson of Indiana (lvt) grounded Kentuckry center Mike Phillips to
help the Hoosiers to a 9g74 earbFseason win.

68

Coach Joe B. Hall had reason to be down after the initial meeting
between the Wildcats and Hoosiers during the 197475 season.

compete on the varsity and Robey moved into the starting lineup with
Conner, Flynn, Grevey and Guyette.

Grevey was a 6-5 forward who moved into the starting lineup as a
sophomore, the first year he was eligible to join the varsity.  He was
a smooth mover who played with great finesse.  He was one of Kentucky's
best medium-range shooters with that sweet left-handed stroke.

Kevin was very outgoing and a very likeable young man.  He was regarded
the best player in Ohio coming out of high school and he got better
with age as a Wildcat.

Conner was "Mr. Basketball" in Kentucky as a high school player, and
he too, joined the starting lineup as a sophomore.  Jimmy Dan was a
very tough competitor.  He's the guy you'd like to have as a foxhole
buddy.  He was the leader on the team as a senior and he really was at
his best in the big games.  He was a tough defensive player who could
dominate an opponent.

69

Mike Flynn, like Grevey and Conner, became a starter as a sophomore.

Mike had been "Mr. Basketball" in the state of Indiana and came to the
Wildcats with impressive credentials.  Flynn was the quickest of the
Cats and also an outstanding defensive player.  He could really pick an
opponent's pocket.  Mike was a good scorer, but with so much firepower
on that team he was content to be more of a playmaker and defensive
specialist.

Guyette moved into the starting lineup as a junior.  At 6-8, he was the
tallest of the former "Super Kittens."  Bob had played the center
position his junior year and was a good scorer and a rugged
rebounder.

With the addition of Robey and Phillips, Guyette was moved to a forward
position opposite Grevey.  Robey, at i10, gave the Cats much-needed
height.

That was the lineup Hall sent against a very talented Indiana team Bob
Knight had assembled in Bloomington for that December 7 engagement.

Hoosier center Kent Benson totally dominated Robey.  He outscored,
outrebounded and physically dominated the Kentucky freshman.  It wasn't
just Robey who was abused.  The Hoosiers totally dominated Kentucky and
coasted to a 98-74 blowout.  It could have been worse, but Knight
called off the dogs and sent his subs in with several minutes to
play.

The game was even more lopsided than the score would indicate.

Two nights later in Louisville, the Wildcats seemed destined to revert
to their losing ways of the year before when they played a good North
Carolina team.  The Tar Heels had almost doubled the score at 31-16
when Hall called a timeout.  He benched four starters.  When the
starters got back into the game, they went to war.  Leading the charge
was Conner, who scorched the nets for 35 points to lead the Cats to a
9S78 victory over a fine North Carolina team.  Hall called it Conner's
best game ever.

Grevey said recently "Jimmy Dan was our emotional leader.  When we
started to sag, he would do something spectacular to bring us back
up.

He would pop us in the chest and say, Come on, we gotta win.  Let's
play."  I don't think I ever saw a playerjust take over a game the way
70

Benson and his Indiana teammates found the going much rougher against
Kentudky's Slaughterhouse Five" in the teams' second meeting.

he did against North Carolina."  Grevey said the North Carolina game
put the team back on track to have a good season.

The team lost only four more games the rest of the campaign and won a
share of the Southeastern Conference championship and made the NCAA
Tournament.

Kentucky had an easy time against Al McGuire's Marquette team with a
76-54 win at Tuscaloosa, Alabama, to advance to the Mideast Regional in
Dayton, Ohio.  The Wildcats dispatched Central Michigan to make it into
the regional final against their old adversary, Indiana.

The Hoosiers hadn'tjust flexed their muscles against Kentucky.

They had raced through their entire schedule undefeated with an average
win margin of 23 points.  They came into Dayton that afternoon ranked
No.  1 in the country and were favored by a dozen points over the
Wildcats.

The UK players were actually looking forward to the rematch.  Hall had
told them they would have to meet Indiana's physical play with a
physical game of their own.  Grevey said every player realized he would
have to be at the top of his game for the entire 40 minutes to beat
Indiana and all the players were really excited that afternoon.

"Mike Flynn wanted it in the worst way," Grevey said.  "Being from
Indiana, I know it really meant a lot to him."

The Hoosiers opened up as if it was going to be a second straight rout
of the Wildcats.  They dashed out to an 8-2 early lead and led by seven
before Kentucky caught up at the half, 44-44.  The first half had been
very physical, but the second half was almost like a brawl with each
team dishing it out.  Flynn had played magnificently in the first half,
but he really turned his game up a notch after the intermission.  He
went a perfect six-for-six from the field and led Kentucky with 22
points.

Kent Benson was brilliant again with 33 points and 23 rebounds, but he
couldn't overcome the overall play of the Wildcats and Kentucky
prevailed, 92-90, in one of the best games anybody ever saw.

Kentucky held the 92-90 lead with only five seconds to play.  The 72

A more rugged Phillips helped Kentucky avenge its prior loss to the
Hoosiers with a 98-90 win over indiana in the NCAA Tournament, despite
another stellar performance from Benson.

Cats lined up in single file right in front of our broadcast spot for
an inbounds play and I caught Grevey's eye.  He just puffed out his
cheeks and went, "Phew!"  as if to indicate just what a tense, tough
game it had been.  Conner got the inbounds pass, but by the time
Indiana chased him down to foul him, only one second remained.  Conner
missed the free throw, but the game ended before Indiana could even try
a shot.

A Chicago sportswriter dubbed that Kentucky team the "Slaughterhouse
Five."  He wrote they were like five guys who make their living
sledge-hammering steers in a stockyard.  It was a brutally physical
game, make no mistake about that.  Grevey looked back at the game and
said, "It was the most physical game I ever played in, bar none, and I
played 10 years in the NBA.  I can't remember a game I played in at
Kentucky that was as important or where we had more at stake.  After
being annihilated by Indiana in Bloomington earlier in the season, we
seniors really wanted our last year to be special and we realized one
way to do that was to beat Indiana in the rematch."

I followed the team bus from Dayton back to Lexington.  As soon as the
bus hit the state line, a police escort picked up the team.

Memorial Coliseum was packed when the players arrived and they had the
damnedest celebration you ever saw.  You would have thought the
Wildcats had already won the national championship.  The win over
Indiana meant that muchþperhaps too much.

Grevey said the Wildcat players celebrated for two days before going to
the Final Four in San Diego.  "It was the biggest win in our careers at
Kentucky," Grevey said.  "I think we all thought that beating No.  1
ranked Indiana was our championship.  We spent ourselves, no question
about it.  If Goose Givens hadn't had such a great game against
Syracuse, we might have struggled with that team in the semifinal."

Kentucky romped past Syracuse, but lost two nights later to UCLA in
John Wooden's last game as the coach of the dynastic
Bruins.  UCLA won a scrappy 92-85 decision for its 10th NCAA
championship.

Kentucky fans everywhere remember the win over Indiana that season, and
it still ranks as one of the greatest NCAA Tournament games ever
played.

The Chicago sportswriter who dubbed Kentucky the "Slaughterhouse
Five" called the Wildcats' win their biggest in a decade.  Kentucky
fans would call it one of the biggest in history.

After the Final Four, Kentucky was met with another big celebration
back in Lexington and Joe B. Hall got an extension on his contract.

76

Going Out in a Blaze of Glory If ever a team enjoyed a better
home-court advantage than the Wildcats did in Memorial Coliseum, it has
been a well-kept secret.

When the 11,500-seat facility was completed in 1950, at a cost of
almost $4 million, many skeptics were quick to brand it a "white
elephant."  It never was.  Memorial Coliseum was a success right from
the startþboth on the court and in the stands.  When the Wildcats moved
to Rupp Arena in 1976, Kentucky teams had lost only 38 times while
recording 308 victories.  No win came any harder than the last one.

Coach Joe B. Hall was understandably nervous for the final game
scheduled in the Coliseum as he prepared to close out the season
against Mississippi State on March 8, 1976.  He had lost the guts of
the team that had made it all the way to the NCAA final the year
before.

Kevin Grevey, Jimmy Dan Conner, Mike Flynn and Bob Guyette had
graduated.

Rick Robey, who had started as a freshman, was injured at mid-season
and was out for the year.

"I had invited Coach Rupp and Harry Lancaster to sit on the bench with
us that night," Hall said, "and we had a lot of former players back who
had played in that first game in the Coliseum.  It was a rebuilding
year for us.  We were 10 and 10, but we had won five in a row going
into that game with Mississippi State."

77

An overflow crowd of around 13,000 packed infor the final Wildcat game
in Memorial Coliseum on March 8, 1976.

Hall liked his team's chances of winning but he was a bit more on edge
than usual knowing it would be the Wildcats' last game in the
Coliseum.

It was a very emotional night.  A crowd estimated at 13,000, 1,500 over
capacity, came early and came ready.  The old place was 78 rocking and
had reached a frenzy when the ceremonies began.  There was Rupp, decked
out in his traditional brown suit, on the bench.

Reggie Warford, the team's only senior, came out to a standing
ovation.

The night was off to a perfect start.

The Wildcats went ahead early but Mississippi State caught up and
seemed to be in control as the half ended with the Bulldogs on top
5042.

They maintained that lead as things began to go badly for
Kentucky.

The Cats had to play the last six minutes without their big man when
6-10

Mike Phillips was ejected from the game for committing, what the
official perceived as, a flagrant foul.  Mike had scored 22 points and
hauled down nine rebounds.

"It was a terrible call," Hall remembered.  "State's Al Perry hadfallen
down and he just locked his legs around Mike's legs.  All Mike did
wasjust try to get loose.  The official claimed Mike kicked Perry.

It was a very bad call and it cost us our only big man."

When 6-5

James Lee fouled out a little later, Kentucky was really reduced to a
small lineup.  Jack Givens, at 6-4 was the tallest Kentucky player on
the court.  He was joined by Merion Haskins, Bob Fowler, Larry Johnson
and Reggie Warford.

With only 83 seconds showing on the clock, Mississippi State was
leading 84-77.  Surely there was no way the Cats could pull this one
out.

Surely they would suffer the indignity of losing the last game ever
played at Memorial Coliseum.  During a timeout, some of the Mississippi
State players walked over to their radio announcer to shout to the
folks back home that the Bulldogs had beaten Kentucky.  There was much
celebration.  The celebration turned out to be a bit premature.

"We were so doggone small we didn't have any business beating anybody,"
Hall said.  "I told our players that we were quicker than they were and
that if we would really hustle on defense, we could still win the
game.

Merion Haskins came up with a big steal for us and that really got us
going."

Johnson drilled a 15-foot jump shot.  After another steal, Warford hit
from the baseline and Kentucky had cut four off that seven-point lead
as the scoreboard showed the Bulldogs still in front, 84-81.

Perry went to the free throw line for a one-and-a-bonus.  He hit the
first but missed the bonus, and Kentucky got the rebound that resulted
in "Johnson layup at the other end.  State led 85-83 and only 43
seconds remained.  The Bulldogs were showing signs of folding.  They
were making turnovers and hurrying their shots.

80

James Lue waged war with the Bulldogs' inside operatives all night long
before fouling out in regulation.

Kentucky outscored the Bulldogs eight to one in the final 83 seconds to
send the game into overtime.

State was trying to run off some clock, and Kentucky had to gamble on a
steal.  The Bulldogs' Ray White was fouled.  He went to the line but
missed the first shot of a one-and-one.  Kentucky got the rebound and
called timeout with only 26 seconds left.

82

ldcats
best hope was to score a field goal and send the game into overtime.

"We set up a play during the timeout," Hall said.  "We had plenty of
time to get a good shot and we called a play that would get the ball to
[Bob] Fowler, in close to the basket."

Fowler broke for the basket too early, rendering the play useless.

Givens still had the ball and was trying to ad lib a play.  All of a
sudden he found himself wide open.  "The only thing I could do was
shoot it," Givens said.  Shoot he did.  Score he did.  The incredible
comeback was complete.  Kentucky had outscored Mississippi State eight
to one over the last 83 seconds.  The score was tied 85-85 but the game
would be decided in overtime.

"Our little team just hung in there," Hall said, "and we felt that we
had all the momentum on our side."  In the overtime, Givens scored
inside and Johnson hit from outside to get the Cats off and running.

Mississippi State had to foul and Kentucky made five of eight free
throws down the stretch.  The Cats pushed the lead out to 94-91 and Joe
B. told his players not to foul.  State ran down court for an
uncontested basket and Kentucky had earned a wild and crazy 94-93
victory.

"All the Kentucky tradition, all the history and all the spirits of
past players won that game," Hall told me recently, "I really believe
that," he said.

Hall awarded the game ball to his old boss and predecessor, and Rupp
seemed to be in the best mood anyone had seen since he was forced out
as the coach four years earlier.

It was a happy crowd that saw the Cats go out a winner at Memorial
Coliseum, the house that "Rupp built."  But it was an exhausted bunch
of Wildcat supporters.  I remember, after doing the postgame program
with Joe, I was walking back out onto the floor of the Coliseum and I
saw this lady still sitting there.  "I don't know whether we'll renew
our season tickets next year or not," she told me.  "This team has just
about killed me.  I liked it better in the old 83 days when you could
just sit back and watch them kill somebody."

Let the record show she was right back in Rupp Arena backing the Cats
the next season.

That Kentucky team went on to the NIT when that entire tournament was
still played in New York and still held much more stature than it does
today.  Kentucky was one of several fine teams in the field.  Joe B.

again invited Coach Rupp to accompany the team to New York.

"Blowout" was a foreign word to that Kentucky team.  It had to play
hard to win close decisions.  First up for the Wildcats was Niagara.

Kentucky led most of the way but Niagara kept coming back on the
Cats.

Behind a 20-point, eight-rebound performance by James Lee, the Cats
earned a 67-61 decision.  That gave the Cats the right to move on to
face one of the seeded teams in the tournament, Kansas State, with its
talented backcourt tandem of Chuckie Williams and Mike Evans.

"Kansas State was one of the favorites to win the tournament," Hall
recalled, "and we knew we had to play a super game to win."

It was another struggle but with Lee again having a 20-point game, the
Cats prevailed 81-78.  Providence had upset Louisville, another seeded
team, to set up the semifinal game.

I always admired the coaching abilities of Joe B. and he really put on
a coaching clinic in the NIT that year.  He had a different game plan
for every team the Wildcats faced and each plan worked to perfection.

Providence had a big center, Bob Misevicius, who was very mobile in the
open court.  Against Louisville, Misevicius took the Cardinals' center
in backsourt and just drove by him all day.  Mike Phillips was a fine
center but Mike wasn't the quickest player who ever lived.  Hall
devised a plan where James Lee would guard Misevicius in the backcourt
and there wasn't a center in the college game who could drive by Lee in
the open court.

If Misevicius went down inside, Phillips picked him up.

Kentucky led most of the game, but a fine Providence team kept battling
back and finally gained the lead at 78-77 with just 84

Jack Givens'jumper tied the Mississippi State game at 85 to close out
regulation.  He also hit the first basket in the overtime period to get
the Wildcats started, and they went on to post a 9+93 win.

85 seven seconds showing on the clock.  The Cats called a timeout.

"James Lee had the hot hand that whole tournament," Hall said, "and I
told Larry Johnson to look for James down low."

Coach Joe B. Hail presented the game b"X to Adolph Rupp following
the final Kentucky victory in the "House That Rupp Built."  86

Phillips bobbled the inbounds pass but got control and passed to
Johnson.  Larry didn't have time to look for Lee, so he took it to the
basket himself.  He twisted under for the shot among a host of
Providence defenders and it went in.  Kentucky won 79-78.

Kentucky had won its first three games in the NIT by a total of 10
points.  The Cats had beaten Niagara by six, Kansas State by three and
Providence by one.  The Wildcats now would face North Carolina
Charlotte for the championship.  The 49ers, like Kentucky, had been
squeaking by all of their opponents.  UNC Charlotte was coached by a
native of Lexington, Lee Rose, who had built a fine coaching reputation
at Transylvania.  At UNC Charlotte, Rose had a good team led by a
marvelous player named Cedric "Cornbread" Maxwell.

Fouls plagued the Wildcats in that title game.  With more than 10
minutes to play, Givens, Phillips and Lee were all on the bench with
four fouls.  Reggie Warford, the only senior and the team captain, had
not scored a field goal in Kentucky's first three NIT games but he got
it going when he had to.  He nailed 14 points in the championship game,
and it was his jump shot that pushed Kentucky ahead for good at
64-63.

The Wildcats went on to win the big trophy with a 71-67 decision.

"That team was the most fun to coach of any team I had at Kentucky,"
Hall told me recently.  "We didn't have much size and we didn't have
much experience, but they were a scrappy bunch.  That team was very
close.  Any coach likes to see his team improve as the season goes
along and that team was only 10-10 at one point in the season.  It won
its last 10 in a row for a 20-10 record and an NIT championship."

That team did accomplish a lot, including closing Memorial Coliseum
with an impossible comeback victory.  Itjust kept rolling from there.

It seldom won by much but, somehow, it usually found a way to win.

87

The Fabulous 14

Alexander Gomelsky is a small man with gray hair and while his name
might not have been a household word in Kentucky in early November,
1977, he was well known among the men who coached basketball all over
the world.  Gomelsky coached the Soviet Union National Team and brought
them into Memorial Coliseum to meet the Wildcats.  After watching
Kentucky virtually destroy his team 109-75, Alexander, in his broken
English said of the UK team, "Best team I ever look."

This was Joe B. Hall's sixth team after he took over the coaching duties
from Adolph Rupp.  Hall had won or shared three Southeastern Conference
Championships, a National Invitation Tournament and had gone on to the
final of the NCAA Championship in 1975 before losing to UCLA in John
Wooden's last game.  Still, he was unable to escape the long shadow of
the legendary Rupp.  Hall had what he considered to be his best team
for the 1977-78 season and even before the campaign got underway, he
told the Lexington Rotary Club that his goal was to win the NCAA
championship.

Joe B. had good reason for his optimism, since had a veteran team
returning.  Most of the players had been there the year before when the
Wildcats ran off a sparkling 26-4 record and ad 89

The basketb"U world lost a great teacher on December 10, 1977, when
Adolph Rupp passed away.

winced to the NCAA Regional Final before losing to North Carolina by
seven.  The entire front line was back, which included the "Twin
Towers," Rick Robey and Mike Phillips, along with Jack Givens.  All
three were seniors.  Truman Claytor, junior, was at one of the guards,
while Kyle Macy was the newcomer to the starting five at the other
guard.

Robey was 6-10 and strong as a bull.  He was the most outgoing of
the Kentucky players and was certainly one of the leaders on the
club.

He was the most seasoned player on a veteran team.  All the seniors had
been battle-tested as freshmen when Kentucky went to the Final Four,
but Rick was the only one who started most of the games.  He was the
leading rebounder and second-leading scorer on the 1978 team.

Phillips was also 6-10 and, like Robey, had the power and strength to
have his way around the basket.  He was very accurate in his field goal
attempts, especiallywhen he got the ball in the low post.  Mike was a
very aggressive player and never backed down from anything.

At 6-4, Jack "Goose" Givens was the smallest of the front court
players, but he was a ballet dancer in sneakers.  Givens was so smooth
another of his nicknames was "Silk."  He was a talented left hander who
could really light it up when he hit his groove.

Jay Shidler likely would have been one of the starters but he broke his
foot during preseason practice and actually showed up for media day on
crutches.  Truman Claytor took over for him in the backcourt.

Claytor was a much underrated player on that team.  He could bust a
zone with his excellent outside shooting and he played a good
hard-nosed defense.

Coach Joe B. Hall had maintained during the off season that Kyle Macy
would make the big difference in the team.  Macy had transferred after
his freshman year at Purdue and had been redshirted the previous
season.

Kyle's father was a coach, so Macy was one of those gym rats who really
understood the game.  He was an excellent shooter from the perimeter
and was at his best when the game was on the line.  He still holds
several Kentucky free throw shooting records.

If there was a better sixth man in the country than James Lee, his name
is a secret.  Lee was 6-5 with an imposing physique.  Macy said players
on the other teams would often ask him if the senior was as mean as he
looked.  Lee actually was somewhat of a cutup off the floor, but he had
the ability to completely turn a game around when he came in off the
bench.

Hall had a long and talented bench.  Shidler, Freddie Cowan, Dwane
Casey and L"Von Williams had many great moments for the Wildcats during
the season.

The talent and experience of that 1978 team was not lost on the
pollsters.  Kentucky was everybody's No.1 at the start of the season.

The Cats lived up to the billing.  They opened up with homecourt wins
over Southern Methodist and Indiana and went to Lawrence, Kansas, to
take on a talented Jayhawk team.  Kentucky won a hardfought 73-66
decision, but that will always be one of the saddest days in Kentucky
basketball to me.  It was December 10, 1977.  We left Allen Fieldhouse
after the broadcast on a night that seemed extremely cold compared to
our weather back in Kentucky.  Back at the motel, I went by the room of
Jim Pyne and Seth Hancock.  It was there that I got the devastating
news.  Adolph Rupp was dead.  Seth had called back to Kentucky and
learned of the death.  I knew that Coach Rupp was very seriously ill,
but to me, he just seemed indestructible.

During my first 19 years of broadcasting the Kentucky games, Rupp had
been the coach.  He was my friend, my mentor, just a person I admired
tremendously.  The news of his death was a great blow.

The team was playing up to its No.  1 ranking.  It ran off 14 straight
wins before a trip on January 23, 1978, to Tuscaloosa, Alabama.  C.M.

Newton's Alabama team belted the Cats 78-62.

Newton recalled that game recently.  He said that his assistant, Wimp
Sanderson, came back from scouting UK with the word that Alabama
simply couldn't match up with Kentucky.  Newton had a fine team led by
Reggie King who was to become the leading scorer in Alabama history.

"Since Wimp felt we couldn't match up with Kentucky's tremendous
advantage in size," Newton said, "we thought we might give them some
matchup problems by starting a smaller, quicker team.  We started three
guards and it worked out well for us."

Kentucky came back home to win three straight against Georgia, Florida
and Auburn before heading back out on the road to play LSU.  It was to
be the most dismal trip of the season.  Dale Brown had a good team led
by two Kentuckians, Rudy Macklin and Kenny Higgs.  If losing wasn't
embarrassing enough for Kentucky, the way it lost was.  With the game
tied at the end of regulation play, all five LSU starters had fouled
out going into the overtime.  LSU won 95-94.

Because of Kentucky's size and strength, opposing coaches had some
unflattering things to say about the Cats.  Kentucky was brutalizing
the game.  Kentucky had taken the finesse out of the game.  But the
unkindest cut of all was to come from the coach.  Some of 93

Jack Givens rose to the occasion in the NCAAfinal against Duke, as the
Goose scorched the netsfor 4I points.

94

Kentucky's best teams had nicknames such as the "Fabulous Five" and the
"Fiddlin' Five" but a disgruntled Joe B. Hall, after the game,
suggested this group should be known as the "Foldin' Five."

Kentucky slowly began to right its ship after the LSU debacle and went
undefeated through the regular season and put another SEC Championship
in its trophy case.

The run for the NCAA Championship began in Knoxville against Florida
State.  Hall fretted that most upsets come in opening games in the NCAA
and he turned out to be almost a prophet.  The Seminoles outplayed the
favored Wildcats and held a 39-32 lead at the half.  Hall was so angry
with his starters that he went to his bench for the start of the second
half with Dwane Casey, L"Von Williams and Fred Cowan starting in place
of Robey, Givens and Claytor.  They joined Macy and Phillips for the
second half tip-off and that makeshift lineup actually cut two points
off the Florida State lead.  When Hall came back with the starters, UK
won a hardfought 85-76 decision.  Macy said, "We had been lucky.  We
had won on a bad day."

The Wildcats moved on to Dayton, Ohio, for the Mideast Regional, to
face Miami of Ohio.  It was no contest, as Kentucky's size and
experience was too much for Miami, and the Wildcats coasted to a 91-69
victory.

That set up the Regional Final with Michigan State and its fabulous
freshman, Earvin "Magic" Johnson.  The Spartans' coach, Jud Heathcote,
seemed concerned with Kentucky's size and muscle.  Before the game,
Heathcote said, "Even watching Kentucky kind of bruises you up a
bit."

He packed in a zone to stop the Cats' powerful inside game and Michigan
State held a 27-22 lead at the half.  That was an outstanding Kentucky
team because it could adjust to almost any situation, and it was a
suggestion from Hall's assistant, Leonard Hamilton, that caused Hall to
improvise in the second half.  As Kyle Macy recalled, "We had already
left the dressing room and were warming up for the second half when
Coach Hall yelled for Rick Robey and me to come over to the bench.

95

While we were standing there, he went over this play for us."  Hall
went over the plan that Hamilton had suggested.  Robey would come out
high around the top of the free throw circle and set picks for Macy.

That forced the Spartans to let Macy stroke the jumper or to foul
him.

It worked to perfection.  As Macy remembered, "With a little over six
minutes to play, Rick set a perfect pick on Michigan State's Terry
Donnelly and I hit myjump shot off the right side of the free throw
circle.  Donnelly got me just as I shot and I made the free throw."

That broke a 4141 tie and Kentucky went on to win 5249 and earn a trip
to the Final Four in St.  Louis.

In the semifinal in the Checkerdome, Kentucky faced an Arkansas team
led by three guardsþSidney Moncrief, Marvin Delph and Ron Brewerþand
coached by Eddie Sutton, who would become Hall's successor at Kentucky
in 1985.  The game was billed as Kentucky's power against the quickness
of Arkansas.

It was an outstanding game with Kentucky clinging to a 32-30 lead at
the half.  The Cats began to take control in the second half after
Sutton went to a zone to protect his team, which was in severe foul
trouble.

When that didn't work, he went back to man-to-man, even going into a
full-court press, and cut the Kentucky lead to one.  Macy thought a
play Hall had put in earlier that season was the key to a Kentucky
victory.

"I thought our Rick Rick' was the key play," he said.  Against the
press, Macy would take the ball out of bounds, Robey and Phillips would
station themselves at midcourt and Claytor and Givens would try to get
open for the inbounds pass.  If that didn't work, Macy would yell,
"Rick Rick," and Robey and Phillips would run toward Macy to get open
while Givens would wheel and head for the Kentucky basket on a dead
run.  Against Arkansas, Givens got open for easy layups and Kentucky
went on to a narrow 64-59 win.

All season long, Kentucky had been painted as a big, muscular team
without quickness.  It was not an accurate description.  Robey had good
quickness for his size and Givens and Claytor had good quickness by any
comparison.  After the loss to the Wildcats, Sutton
said as much: "Anybody who said Kentucky did not have quickness
should have his head examined."  Duke coach Bill Foster, after watching
Kentucky beat Arkansas, said, "Kentucky has been represented as a power
team because of their big frontcourt players, but I'm impressed with
their quickness and their pressure defense."  Two days later, Foster
would send his Duke team against the Wildcats for the national
championship.

Sunday was an off day for the teams to get in their final practices and
to attend the obligatory press conferences.  The stories that came out
of those painted Duke as a young, fun-loving team and Kentucky as a
sober, too-serious bunch.  Jack Givens said the team went to St. Louis
for only one purpose.  That purpose was to win the championship.

Macy gave much of the credit for that team's success to the leadership
of the four seniors.  He said when the team went back to the dressing
room following warmups that, before the coaches got there, the seniors
reminded the other players to remember all the things the team had gone
through and how close the team was to its goal.  When Coach Hall went
over the game plan, he reminded the team that Duke had used the fast
break to get to the final and he wanted them to shut it down and not to
allow any runouts.  Macy said, "I don't think they got a single one on
us."

Duke opened in a 2-3 zone, and as the game unfolded, Hall noticed they
were packing the inside players back deep while using the front two to
guard against the outside shooting skills of Macy and Claytor.  Hall
noticed that left a hole right in the middle of the zone.  He recalled
after the game, "When we saw how open Duke was leaving the middle, we
junked our game plan and just tried to get it to Jack."

If any Kentucky player had a more spectacular game than Jack Givens did
in that 1978

NCAA final game, I can't dig it out of my memory bank.  He was
magnificent.  Not that he was a one-man show, he wasn't.  Robey took 11
shots and hit eight.  Macy fired only three times from the field and
made them all.  This was a very un 98

Rick Robey, who had an outstanding shooting night himself, savored the
moment after the nets came down in St. Louis' Checkerdomefollowing the
Wildcats' victory to claim the 1978 national championship.

99 selfish team, and with Givens holding the hot hand, his teammates
got him the ball.  The smooth lefthander put it up 27 times, almost 40
percent of the shots taken by the whole team.  Givens had saved his
best for his last game as a Wildcat, and his 41 points shredded the
Blue Devils.

Hall took his starters out late in the game, but as Duke closed the
gap, the starters went back in and won the game, 94-88.James Lee
running out on the final UK play to put the icing on the cake with one
of his patented thunder dunks.

It was the fifth NCAA Championship for the Wildcats.  It was a shining
hour for Joe B. Hall, recognized now for the fine coaching it took to
build and develop the team and to guide it through the perilous waters
all the way to the title.  He had finally escaped the foreboding shadow
of Rupp.  It was a shame Rupp didn't live long enough to see Hall and
the Wildcats win.  He would have been very proud.

The Kentucky cheerleaders linked arms out in the center of the court
there in the Checkerdome and their words expressed the feelings of
Kentucky fans everywhere, "The sun shines bright on my old Kentucky
home..."

Nobody was calling these champions the "Foldin' Five."  Not now.

The team never did pick up one of those nicknames Kentucky fans like to
bestow.  Make no mistake this was a TEAM and I liked a homemade sign a
fan held aloft at the celebration the next night in Memorial
Coliseum.

It read "The Fabulous 14."

100

Kyle and Claytor and the Boys In my 39 years as the UK basketball
announcer, I could count on one hand the times I thought the situation
was hopeless for the Wildcats near the end of the game.  Certainly one
of those games took place during the 1978-79 season.  Remember, there
was no three-point shot then and Kentucky was trailing by six points
with only 31 seconds to play.  I saw no chance for the Cats.  Could you
blame me?  Well, that night I learned my lesson.

Kentucky won the NCAA Championship in 1978, but when Joe B. Hall
marshalled his troops for the start of the 1978-79 season, the heart
and soul of that championship team was gone.  Rick Robey, Mike
Phillips, Jack Givens and James Lee had played out their eligibility.

Both starting guards, Kyle Macy and Truman Claytor, were back, as were
experienced players Jay Shidler, L"Von Williams, Fred Cowan and Chuck
Aleksinas.

Added to the mix was a talented freshman class of Dwight Anderson,
Chuck Verderber and Clarence Tillman.

For the opening of the season, Hall started Aleksinas at center,
Williams and Verderber at the forwards and Macy and Claytor at the
guards.  After coasting past La Salle and West Texas in Rupp Arena, the
Cats eagerly anticipated a visit from the Kansas Jayhawks.  Kansas had
won all four starts and had two of the premier Afamiliar sight during
the 197&79 season, Truman Claytor heading up the court afterforcing a
turnover.

players in the game in Darnell Valentine and 7-2

Paul Mokeski.

Dwight Anderson had worked his way into the Kentucky starting lineup,
replacing Verderber at one of the forwards.  The Dayton freshman was
only 6-3, but he could really jump and move.  I 102 thought he was the
quickest player to ever suit up in the blue and white and I gave him
the nickname "The Blur."

Kentucky got its first lead over Kansas early in the game, as the Cats
edged ahead 10-8, but from there on it was all Kansas and the Jayhawks
led by 10 at the intermission.  Kentucky kept fighting back and, with
Macy and Shidler connecting from long range, the Wildcats cut it to two
points inside the last three minutes.  Macy, known more for his
shooting than his defense, made a clean steal from the dribbling Tony
Guy and raced down the court for a layup to tie the count at 56-56 with
2:43 left in the game.  Kansas was playing for the last shot, but
Claytor put such defensive heat on Valentine that the officials called
for a jump ball with 52 seconds left.  Kansas got the tip and called a
timeout with 19 seconds left to set up the last shot.  Everybody in
Rupp Arena knew it would be taken by Valentine.  It was, but the shot
was off target at the buzzer.  Overtime.  The Jayhawks took command
again in the overtime and that brought us to the situation where
Kentucky was down 66-60 with only 31 seconds to play.  During a
timeout, Coach Hall recalls that he had not lost hope.  "Actually, I
still thought we would win the game.  I told our players exactly what
we had to do to win.  We had to draw a charge and we had to make some
steals."  That was about to happen.

Kansas coach Ted Owens had cautioned his team against fouling and
Anderson was able to drive unmolested to the basket to cut the lead to
four, 66-62.  Only 22 seconds remained.

Kansas took the ball out of bounds and the Kentucky players put on a
ferocious defense.  Before the ball ever was put in play, Valentine was
called for pushing Anderson and the Kentucky player was put on the free
throw line.  Unfortunately, Anderson missed.  Fortunately, in a wild
scramble for the rebound, Anderson used his quickness to come up with
the ball.  As he drove for the basket, Mokeski was called for the
foul.

This time, with only 10 seconds left, "The Blur" hit both free
throws.

Kansas 66, UK 64.

The fur was really flying.  Kansas called its final timeout.

103

Coach Hall gave the team virtually the same instructions-he had given
earlierþtry for a steal or hope for a charging foul, if that didn't
work, foul.  Hoo boy, what a game!

On the inbounds pass Anderson again called on his incredible quickness
and was able to deflect the ball.  It was clearly going out of bounds,
but Anderson left his feet and made just an impossible play.  With his
back to the court, soaring through the air, he tipped the ball back
onto the playing surface with one hand.  It was the last he saw of the
play as he went tumbling head-over-heels into the UK bench.

Kyle Macy didn't see the defensive acrobatics of Anderson.  Macy was
face-guarding his man, trying to deny the inbounds pass.  When he heard
the roar of the crowd, Kyle turned to see what was happening.  What he
saw was the ball bouncing his way.  Macy scooped it up and moved toward
the basket.  From 15 feet away, he squared up and let it fly.  Swish!

Three seconds left.  The scoreboard beamed the incredible comeback:
Kansas 66, Kentucky 66.

Kansas' John Stallcup instinctively signaled for a timeout, but
the Jayhawks had already used up their allotment and a technical was
called.

Macy was at the line.  He got one shot.  The game was now his to win.

As he did so many times during his career, Macy won it.  True, the ball
bounced a few times on the rim, which was very unusual for a Macy free
throw, but the ball dipped into the net and Kentucky had completed a
remarkable comeback to win 67-66.

By no means was the 1978-79 Kentucky team one of the top Wildcat units
and after that heart-stopping win over Kansas, the Cats dropped two of
their next three.  Still, the Cats took a 4-2 record to Louisville to
face the nation's second-ranked team, Notre Dame.  Leading by 12 points
in the second half, coach Digger Phelps, for some reason, changed his
defense, putting pressure on the UK guards in a man-to-man situation,
while putting his three big men inside in a triangle zone.  Hall made a
brilliant counter-move, by placing Anderson in the top of the key.

He was 104

Kyle Macy earned most valuable player honorsfollowing a stellar SEC
Tournament in 1979, which included a 32point outburst by the sharp
shooter against Ole Miss in the opening round.

far too quick for Notre Dame's big people and ran around and through
them the remainder of the game as Kentucky won,81-76.  Anderson won the
Bernie Shively Trophy, which went to the best player on either team for
their annual game.

The wheels fell off as Kentucky opened Southeastern Conference play and
the Cats won only one of their first six games.  As so often happens
during bad times, UK lost a starter when Chuck
Aleksinas quit the team.  Kentucky won several close games at the end
of the season but still was able to finish no better than 16-10.  The
regular season was over but the Southeastern Conference Tournament was
being revived after a 27-year absence.

This was a young Kentucky team with only two seniors, Truman Claytor
and Dwane Casey.  Claytor was a hard-nosed player who always was
assigned the other team's best offensive guard.  His teammates called
him "T.C."  and he was very popular with the other players.  Claytor
had a tendency to be a streak shooter but when he had his stroke, he
could be devastating from long range.

No player ever worked harder than Casey.  He probably saw less playing
time as a senior than he did during his junior season but he was always
ready when Joe B. sent him into a game.  Dwane worked just as hard in
practice as he did during a game and he took the off-season so
seriously, he built himself to the point where he was the strongest
player on the team.

For the renewal of the SEC Tournament in 1979, they came up with a
strange format.  The two top-seeded teams, LSU and Tennessee, were
required to win only two games to win the championship while all the
other teams would have to win four games to capture the title.

Kentucky's first opponent was Ole Miss.  The Cats had beaten the Rebels
twice during the regular season, and with Macy shooting the lights out
in the third match, the Wildcats won 82-77.  Kyle's 32 points was his
best scoring effort as a Wildcat.  The Cats advanced to the second
round to face Alabama.

Claytor and Jay Shidler had been sharing the guard position opposite
Macy for most of the season, but in Kentucky's strong showing at the
end of the season, Shidler had gained the starting spot.  Just minutes
before the game with Alabama tipped off, Joe B. decided to start
Claytor.

"It's just a feeling I think every coach gets in his gut from time to
time," Hall said.  "I can't tell you why but I thought Truman was ready
to give us a big game."  Did he ever!

106

Claytor, one of just two seniors on Joe B. Hail's team, helped Kentucky
reach the final of the first SEC Tournament since 1952.

C.M. Newton did not have one of his powerhouses at Alabama, but he
still had a couple of outstanding players in Reggie "Mule" King and
Robert Scott.  It was not a great Kentucky team either, but Hall did
have a pair of great shooting guards in Macy and Claytor.

It was an intensely played game right from the opening tip.  First one
team would go on a run, then the other would answer with a run of its
own.  With the Crimson Tide leading 7-6, Kentucky 107 scored eight
unanswered points to move on top 14-7.  Later an Alabama run pushed the
Tide in front 19-18.  And so it went throughout the first half until
the Tide got hot and mounted an eight-point lead, 5547, with 16 seconds
left in the half.  A Macy jump shot just ahead of the buzzer made it
Alabama 55, Kentucky 49, as the first half ended.

Claytor and Alabama's King put on a shooting clinic in the second
half.

King scored 18 of his 38 points and Claytor poured in 21 of his 25
after the intermission.  Truman, in fact, was unstoppable over the
final 20 minutes, going a perfect nine for nine.

Nobody threw in the towel during this hectic game and with 52 seconds
to play, Kentucky held a one-point lead, 99-98.  Alabama had the ball
and with 30 seconds to go the Tide called a timeout.

King had fouled out a minute earlier and Newton really had only one
choice.  Robert Scott was having a hell of a game.  He had taken 11
shots and connected on 10 of them.  Newton, like all good coaches,
tabbed Scott to take the last shot.  C.M. told his team to work the
clock down to eight seconds and the Tide would win or lose on Scott's
final heave.

With 10 seconds left on the clock, Scott began to make his move to take
Macy one-on-one.  Anderson realized what was happening and left his man
to help Kyle.  Macy got a hand on the ball as Scott pivoted to his left
and Anderson ran to the ball to make the steal.  Scott, in his
frustration, fouled Anderson and Dwight went to the line for the one
and the bonus.  He nailed both and put the game out of reach at
101-98.

Kentucky elected not to guard Alabama, and without the three-point shot
all Alabama's Joe Hancock could do was go for the layup.  Final score:
Kentucky 101, Alabama 100.

In the game, Kentucky and Alabama combined to set two SEC Tournament
recordsþmost points in a single game and most points by both teams.

The Wildcats also set a school fieldgoal accuracy record by shooting a
torrid 68.3 percent.  Next, the Cats would face the regular-season
champion LSU team which would be playing in the tournament for the
first time.  It would be the third game in three days for Kentucky.

It's funny how we can remember some things.  I remember that the
Kentucky-LSU game was only 23 seconds old when Dwight Anderson broke
his wrist and was lost to the team.  The reason I recall the time so
vividly is that Anderson wore No.  23.

The other players just went at it harder and with Macy scoring 29
points and Claytor adding 20, the Cats won surprisingly easy, 80-67.

Kentucky had been the biggest surprise of the tournament and now would
face Tennessee for the championship.

Tennessee was well rested.  It was only the second game of the
tournament for the Vols, while Kentucky was playing for the fourth time
in four days.  Kentucky was noticeably tired but still managed to tough
out a lead by halftime.

With a little over two minutes to play in the game, the score was tied
at 55-55.  Kentucky went into a stall until it called timeout with 12
seconds left to set up the last shot.  Coach Hall told Macy to try and
rub his defensive man off on a screen and to take the last shot.

Tennessee's Terry Crosby got through the screen.  Macy faked and Crosby
left his feet.  Kyle went up for the shot and the two players
brushed.

There was no foul call and the shot missed.  The ball came right back
to Macy.  Realizing there couldn't be much time left, Macy hurriedly
pushed the ball back up.  Again it was off target.  The game went to
overtime and the Vols won 75-69.

Macy was the tournament's high scorer with 93 points and was named
MVP.

Claytor joined him on the all-tournament team.

The season actually ended back in Rupp Arena.  The Cats were invited to
the NIT and faced Clemson on UK's home court.  Clemson won in
overtime, 68-67.

Kentucky finished the year with 19 wins and 12 losses, not a good
record by Kentucky standards, but that was one of the most enjoyable
seasons I spent with the Wildcats.

109

A Christmas to Remember, A March to Forget Kentucky was loaded for the
1983-84 season.  The latest edition of the "Twin Towers" was made up of
seven-footer Sam Bowie and 6-11

Melvin Turpin.Joining these two seniors in the frontcourt was a
marvelous sophomore named Kenny Walker.  The starters in the backcourt
were seniors Jim Master and Dicky Bel.  Master was a deadly outside
shooter and Bel was quick as a cat.  The Cats had a strong bench with
Winston Bennett, Roger Harden,James Blackmon and Paul Andrews.

Kentucky opened the season at home with an easy 65-44 win over
Louisville.  After plugging out a 24-11 victory over a stalling
Cincinnati team in the Queen City, the Cats took a perfect 6-0 record
on the road to play Illinois on Christmas Eve.  It was the only time
the Wildcats played on the day before Christmas in all of my 39 years
as the UK broadcaster, and it is a trip I'll never forget.

Kentucky was originally scheduled to play the Fighting Illini in late
December, but when the Illinois football team made it to the Rose Bowl,
school offcials asked Kentucky to change the date.

"It was going to be an afternoon game," coach Joe B. Hall remembered.

"I talked with the players, and since we would get home early that
evening, they were all for playing on Christmas Eve.  Lou Henson, the
Illinois coach, was a good friend and we were glad to help him out."

The weatherman took care of the schedule.  When Kentucky's chartered
DC-3 landed at Champaign, it was greeted by a huge snow and bitter
cold.

The high temperature for the day was a minus five degrees.  Wind and
blowing snow combined to make the wind chill read a minus 65.

The Wildcats made it to the arena for the game, but the officials
weren't as fortunate.  Three spectators with refereeing experience were
drafted out of the stands and given whistles and sneakers.

Illinois was a perfect 8-0.  A Bowie dunk and a 15-footer by the lanky
senior got Kentucky off and running.  But Illinois seemed to seize the
momentum and, by halftime, was ahead 33-26.  The Cats seemed headed for
overtime after having to scratch and claw to stay even for the first 39
minutes and 52 seconds.  That's when Hall signaled for a timeout with
eight seconds left and the score tied 54-54.  The Cats brought the ball
across midcourt before calling the timeout.

Hall asked James Blackmon to check into the lineup and during the
conversation on the sideline, Joe told the team they were going to run
a one-on-one for James.  In Kentucky's first few games that season
Blackmon had been sensational, but was in a typical freshman slump
before the Illinois game.

"I just had a gut feeling that James was the player to take the last
shot," Hall remembered.  "We had run the same play for him against
Indiana, and his basket sealed the win for us."  The ball came in to
Blackmon and his teammates backed down near the baseline setting up a
one-four offense.  Blackmon was to take his man, Bruce Douglas, and try
to beat him one-on-one.  James moved just to the right of the free
throw circle but Douglas was right in his face.  Blackmon rose for a
15-footer and his shot appeared to be just off to the right but it hit
the glass and banked in as the final second ticked off the clock.

Kentucky won 56-54.  The 7,000 fans who had braved the bitter cold and
deep snow gave both teams a standing ovation.

112

Kenny Walker's inside moves were the perfect complewnent to the power
games of Melvin Turpin and Sam Bowiefor the 1983-84

Wildcats.

113

Both coaches, Hall and Henson, gave the makeshift officiating crew high
marks for their work.  Joe B. says it was the only time in his coaching
career that an official came to him after the game to ask for his
autograph.

Despite the horrid weather conditions, some of the players left right
after the game to join their families for the holidays.  Blackmon, who
was from Indiana, was one of them and he missed sharing his moment of
glory with the media in the post-game press conference.  Some of the
other players had made plans to leave for home after the plane got back
to Lexington around 6 p.m. Earlier that day, Hall received a call that,
because of the extreme cold, they were unable to start the team plane
but that a heater was being flown in from Chicago and the plane should
be able to depart on time.  It was after the game that Joe discovered
that Chicago's O"Hare Airport had also been closed and that the repairs
could not be made on the plane.  Hall would have to find another way to
get his team back to Lexington.  He isn't exactly sure now how he did
it.

"I know we called Greyhound and some of the other established bus
lines," he laughed, "but none of them had anything available on such
short notice on Christmas Eve.  I don't remember exactly how we found
out about him, but we learned of a man there in town that owned and
operated his bus and we were able to get him to agree to drive us to
Lexington."

No one who made that trip will ever forget it.  The heating equipment
on the bus simply could not compete with the sub-zero night.  It was
cold on the bus, so we all sat with our overcoats pulled tightly around
us.

The defroster fought a losing battle and Hall and Leonard Hamilton took
turns standing by the driver to wipe away the frost from the inside of
the windshield.  The diesel fuel was turning to jelly and the bus
labored up the steeper inclines at about 15 miles per hour.  I sat with
Dr. Otis Singletary, the UK President, and I wondered why the big
chief himself would make such a journey on Christmas Eve.  "I couldn't
find anybody at the university other than the players or coaches, who was going," he said,
"so I thought somebody ought to represent the school."  Dr. Singletary
told me that he was going to invite any of the players who couldn't get
home to come to his home for Christmas dinner.

While Santa was making his rounds all over the world, the UK traveling
party was making its miserable way to Lexington.  The bus pulled in
front of Bluegrass Airport at about 6 a.m. on Christmas Day.  Everybody
agreed it was a horrendous journey, but to Joe B the trip was worth
it.

"James made my Christmas," Hall said.

If the Illinois trip was disconcerting to the players, it certainly
didn't show in their play.  The Wildcats ran off five more wins to push
their record to 12-0.  The Cats finished the campaign with 23 wins
against only four losses and claimed another Southeastern Conference
championship.

Kentucky had been dominant in the SEC Tournament in the early days,
winning 13 of the first 19 championships before the tourney was
discontinued after 1952.  After the tournament was resumed in 1979, the
Wildcats failed to win for five straight years.  Many UK fans blamed
the very unlikely string of losses on Hall, an outspoken opponent of
the tournament since its revival.  "I was against it because I think it
was renewed for all the wrong reasons," Hall said.  "There wasn't that
much interest in it outside of Kentucky and Tennessee, and I thought it
took too much out of a team that was going on to the NCAA.  But anybody
who thought I didn't want to win every game I played just didn't know
me very well."  Hall's 1983-84 team was to get the monkey off his
back.

The SEC Tournament was held in Vanderbilt's Memorial Gym in
Nashville.

First up for the Cats was Georgia, and with Melvin Turpin putting on a
clinic, the Wildcats coasted to a 92-79 win.  Turp equaled the scoring
record for a tournament game when he fired in 42 points, matching the
record set 32 years earlier by another Wildcat, Cliff Hagan.  That
would be Kentucky's only laugher in the tournament.  Against Alabama
the next night, Hall went to a play that had won at least two games for
him that season.  He 117

When it comes to aerial acrobatics, few Wildcats have matched the
exploits of Kenny Sky" Walker.

sent his team to a 14 offense, but this time it was Dicky Bel who was
to take his man one-on-one.  Bel came through and the Cats moved into
the final with a 48-46 win over the Crimson Tide.

Even though Kentucky had won the regular season championship, more than
a few gave Auburn the edge to win the tournament title.  Each of the
two teams had won a lopsided victory on its home court.  Auburn boasted
two All-SEC players in Chuck Person and Player of the Year Charles
Barkley.

"I knew they were good players," Hall recalled, "but I didn't know they
were such great players until I saw what they did in the NBA."  Both
teams went at each other with a vengeance.  The game was 40 minutes of
nail-biting, with neither team able to gain much of an upper hand.

There was a stretch in the second half where, on 11 straight trips
downcourt, the offense scored and the lead changed hands on each
occasion.

With Auburn leading 4947, the Cats got a break when the Tigers turned
the ball over.  Kentucky ran some time off the clock and waited for a
play to develop.  Sam Bowie rolled to the basket and Bel lobbed the
pass toward the hoop.  Bowie took it in the air and slammed it through,
completing a perfect alley-oop play to tie the score at 49-49.  It was
another Auburn miscue that gave Kentucky the ball for the last shot.

The Tigers' Gerald White had the ball and when his teammate, Person,
faked UK's Kenny Walker out of his shoes and broke for the basket,
White rifled the pass.  Kentucky's Winston Bennett anticipated the pass
and broke in front of Person to make the interception.

Surely Joe B. would call for the old one-on-one that had been so
successful for him that season.  "We had won with that the night before
against Alabama," Hall said, "and I thought Sonny (Smith the Auburn
coach) would be looking for it.  Kenny Walker hadn't hit a thing in
that Alabama game (one for 11) but he was filling it up in the Auburn
game.

We wanted to get the ball in Bel's hands to start the play and Turpin
and Master would set a double screen for Kenny."

119

Well, you know what they say about the best-laid plans.  Auburn had
seen Bel beat the Crimson Tide and the Tigers weren't about to let
history repeat itself.  With only 14 seconds left on the clock and the
score tied at 4949, Auburn assigned its fine guard, Paul Daniels, to
get in Bel's face and stay there.  Dickyjust couldn't get open to take
the inbounds pass.  Master, sensing that his roommate was in trouble,
broke out and took over Bel's role.  In one of the greatest ad-lib
plays ever, Bel realized that Master had become the playmaker, so he
dropped down to help Turpin set the double screen.  Walker broke out
around the screen and Master hit him with the pass.  Kenny took a
couple of dribbles and went up for a 15-footer just to the right of the
free throw circle.

The ball was short and it hit the front of the rim.  The ball bounced
high in the air, hung suspended, and then dropped through the net as
the final horn sounded.  Kentucky won, 5149.

The Kentucky players began a wild celebration after winning their first
SEC Tournament since its revival five years earlier.  The Auburn
players were devastated.  Charles Barkleyjust sat down on the court and
cried like a baby.

The Wildcats became the first team to win the regular season and
tournament championships in the same year since the SEC started the
tournament again in 1979.  They took their sparkling 26-4 record to
Birmingham and trounced Brigham Young in the NCAA Tournament to earn
the right to return to Rupp Arena, where the Mideast Regional was being
held.

First up for the Wildcats was their in-state neighbor, the Louisville
Cardinals.

After UK and U of L had not played for 25 years, Louisville won an
NCAA Tournament overtime decision in March 1983.  The Cats opened the
1983-84 campaign with an easy win over Louisville, but the Cards showed
a lot of improvement in the rematch.

Bel and Bennett gave Kentucky its final push and UK prevailed,
72-67.

Then the Cats earned Hall his third trip to the Final Four by
outlasting Illinois, 54-51, in the regional title game.

Legendary tough guy Charles Barkley could only sit and weep after
Kenny Walker'sjunw shot dropped through the net to give Kentucky a
51-49 victory in the 1984

SECOND title game.

This was Kentucky's second close win over the Illini during the same
season but this time coach Lou Henson was irate, complaining bitterly
about the officiating.  I have always felt that his tirade

Sam Bowie had many an alley oop dunk in his Career, and will be
remembered as one of the most mobile big men in Wildcat history.

122 had a lot to do with the NCAA later changing the rule so that no
team could play an NCAA game on its home court.

What happened in Seattle at the Final Four is still impossible for me
to explain.  It was the most colossal collapse of a Kentucky team that
I ever saw.  The Cats faced Georgetown and its intimidating center,
Patrick Ewing, in the national semifinal in the Kingdome.  Kentucky
turned in a sterling first half and took a sevenpoint lead to the
dressing room.

Then came a total fold-up as the Cats took 33 shots and made only three
in the second half.  Georgetown won 5340.  Unfortunately, that left a
bitter aftertaste on what had otherwise been a brilliant season.

123

The Yet College Basketball Changed Forever The news came out of Kansas
City like a bolt from the sky.  In late summer of 1986, the NCAA Rules
Committee dropped a bombshell on the nation's college coaches that
would change the game for the coming season and for all time to come.

There had scarcely been a hint that the Committee was coming out with
the rule that any shot taken from behind a line positioned 19 feet and
nine inches from the basket would count for three points.  Shock waves
rumbled through every campus in the country.

"It did catch all of us by surprise," said Eddie Sutton, who was the
coach at Kentucky at the time.  "If we had had any idea the rule was
coming, it would have affected our recruiting plans.  One or two good
shooters that we didn't take would have been high on our list."

Still, Sutton believed he had players who could shoot the three.

"We felt that James Blackmon and Ed Davender would be able to shoot the
three and with Rex Chapman and Derrick Miller coming in, we thought
both of them would be able to score from behind the arc."

Sutton had several players returning from the 1985-86 team that had
fashioned a spectacular 324 record, had won both the SEC regular season
and Tournament championships.  They had 125 advanced to the NCAA Elite
Eight before losing a two-point decision to LSU, a team the Wildcats
had beaten three times that season.

All-American Kenny Walker and playmaker Roger Harden Prior to the
198687 season, a change in NCAA rules instituted the three-point
basket, which paved the way for "3-mania" that is now commonplace in
Rupp Arena.

126 were gone, but in addition to Blackmon and Davender, Sutton was
counting on veterans Winston Bennett, Cedric Jenkins, Paul Andrews and
Rob Lock.

Not long after the beginning of practice however, Bennett went down
with a knee injury that would sideline him for the season and Jenkins
suffered a stress fracture that put him out of action for half the
season.

Right from the start of practice, Sutton began working on the
three-point shot.  "Yeah, we sure did," he said.  His optimism about
his shooters was confirmed.  Blackmon, Davender, Chapman and Miller
were all accurate from behind the arc.  "A lot of people think I'm
conservative, but I'm not.  If I've got somebody that can shoot the
basketball, I'm going to turn him loose," Sutton said.  "I gave those
players a green light to shoot the three."

If any player ever came to Kentucky with the fanfare that preceded Rex
Chapman, it's lost to history.  The 6-5 guard, one of the most
recruited players in years, came out of Apollo High School in
Owensboro, Kentucky.

He had been named to the High School All-American team two years in a
row.  The Associated Press named him Male Athlete of the Year in
Kentucky and he was chosen as the state's"Mr.  Basketball."

It was a day for celebrating when Chapman cast his lot with UK "Our
assistant coaches did a goodjob recruiting Rex," Sutton said, "but I
think he always wanted to come to Kentucky."  The press worked overtime
with slogans like Rex the Boy King, and John McGill, then a sports
columnist for the Lexington Herald-Leader, suggested the name of the
city should be changed to "Rexington."

Chapman didn't start the first game that season against Austin Peay,
but with Kentucky trailing, Sutton sent Rex into the game almost eight
minutes into the contest.  He scored 18 as Kentucky came back to win
and Chapman remained in the starting lineup for the rest of his
career.

Sutton, who always liked a three-guard lineup, finally settled on
Chapman, Davender and Blackmon at the guard spots and Richard Madison
and Rob Lock inside as his starters.  That group 127

Derrich Miler's outside shooting skills made him a bigfan, and user, of
the three-point shot.

won five of its first six games, dropping a five-point decision to
Indiana, as it moved to Freedom Hall for the much anticipated meeting
with the Louisville Cardinals.

128

whether thing it inside orfiringfrom the perimeter,James Blackmon
enjoyed a productive senior season on offense.

Louisville had won the NCAA Championship the prior season and still had
the tournament's MVP, Pervis Ellison, when the two teams squared off on
December 27, 1986.  The Cardinals had lost 129 some key players from
that championship team and Kentucky looked to be a bit stronger.  The
Louisville fans were ready.  Sutton had flamed the fire earlier in the
season by referring to U of L as "little brother."

"I'll never make that mistake again," he laughed recently, "but I
didn't mean for it to sound condescending.  I was thinking Kentucky had
the longer tradition, but boy did I get the Cardinal fans upset."

Sutton thought Kentucky was a slightly better team than the Cardinals
that season, but he expected it to be a close game.  He worked long and
hard against the Louisville press and, with Freedom Hall packed to the
rafters, the game began.  No one expected what was about to
transpire.

Kentucky had really embraced the three-point shot and by the time
Davender, Chapman and Blackmon had all hit from behind the arc, the
Cats had moved ahead 12-10 and they were on top to stay.  Three of
UK's first four baskets were from three-point territory.  The middle
one, a rainbow from behind the NBA line by Chapman, seemed to signal
that the Cats were on their game.  With Rex leading the way, the Cats
had moved ahead by 10 at the intermission,38-28.  Chapman had scored 18
of Kentucky's points, including three three-pointers and a leaning,
off-balance shotjust before the first half ended.

In the UK dressing room, Sutton told his troops not to let up in the
second half.  He counted on a UK lead keeping the crowd out of the
game.

He needn't have worried.

The Cats ran off the first 10 points of the second half and outscored
Louisville 22-4, on the strength of three more three-pointers.  The Cats
led 60-32 with 11:30 left in the game.

Sutton remembers that game well.  "I thought we were a little better
than Louisville that year," he says, "but I sat there in shock like
everybody else.  I sure didn't expect to see anything like what I was
watching."  What he was watching was Kentucky exploding for an 85-51
victory, the worst defeat in Denny Crum's career.

Chapman was brilliant from outside, scoring 26 points, which 130

Ed Davender was part of a big Kentucky comebach that helped it hnock
off Tennessee 91-84 to avenge a wldcat loss in Knoxville earlier in the
198687 season.

included five three-pointers.  Surprisingly, the Wildcats also
dominated the inside with Madison hauling in 17 rebounds and Lock
outscoring and outrebounding Louisville's Ellison.  It was two dunks by
Lock that ended that incredible game.  Sutton said, "Everything just
went our way."  What an understatement!

The Louisville game was the zenith of the entire season for Kentucky.

They went on the road to lose to Georgia in the very next game and
managed only an 18-9 regular season record.  Still, there were
certainly some exciting moments during that campaign.  At Alabama,
Kentucky met the team that had beaten it by 14 points in Rupp Arena.

Down by six points with 1:23 remaining, the Cats clawed back and
Davender's shot with six seconds left gave the Kentucky a 70-69 win.

The next game against Tennessee even outdid that one.

The Vols had beaten Kentucky in Knoxville earlier that season and the
Cats clearly had revenge on their minds for the rematch in Rupp.

The first half was a see-saw battle that saw first one team on top and
then the other.  With three minutes left in the half, the Vols were on
top 31-29 but Kentucky ran off 10 unanswered points to take a 39-31
lead to the dressing room.

Kentucky had held Tennessee's Tony White (the leading scorer in the
SEC) to only four points in the first half.  But White caught fire
after the intermission and blistered the nets for 16 second-half
points.  He led the Vols back.  With only 1:13 remaining in the game,
Tennessee was on top by 10, 75-65.  It looked hopeless.  The Kentucky
faithful lost faith and began filing out of the arena.  To be honest,
had I not been hooked to a microphone, I would have been tempted to
join them.

Sutton had not lost the faith.

"I've been around the game of basketball long enough to understand that
anything can happen," he said.  "With the way the three-point shot had
come into the game, you've always got a chance to pull it out at the
end."  Sutton encouraged his players to believe they could win.

Kentucky fought back.  Chapman fired in a three-pointer from 22 feet.

Tennessee 75, UK 68.  Next, Rex got the chance from the charity stripe
and converted two free throws to cut it to 75-70.  But when White went
to the stripe and made a pair for the Volunteers, he pushed the
Tennessee lead back to seven, 77-70.  There were 132

Rex Chapman, the prototypical brrange bomber, had 26 points and
madefive three-pointers in the Wildcats' 85-51 pasting of Louisville.

133 only 44 seconds to play.  More of the Wildcat faithful headed for
the exits.  The last glimmer of hope seemed to be gone.

Irv Thomas took a turn at being the hero when he grabbed a missed shot
and put the rebound into the hoop.  Tennessee 77, Kentucky 72.  The
scoreboard clock showed 35 seconds remaining.

Kentucky still had a chance but would need some help from the enemy.

The Vols' Doug Roth provided some help when he missed the front end of
a one-and-the-bonus.  Kentucky got the rebound and Davender brought the
ball downcourt and pulled up for a gutsy jump shot from 21 feet.

Swish.

The Vol lead was now down to two, 77-75.  Only 12 seconds remained.  "l
knew we had to foul and to foul quickly," Sutton said.  "We would liked
to have the time to foul their worst free throw shooter but with so
little time left, we just had to foul whoever had the ball."

Unfortunately, the ball came in to Dyron Nix, one of Tennessee's best
free throw shooters.  Nix would get the one-and-thebonus.  Only 11
seconds remained on the clock and Kentucky called a timeout.

"Tennessee was missing free throws and showing signs of tensing up,"
Sutton said.  "We wanted to try and ice Nix with the timeout, and as
soon as the timeout was over, we turned right around and called another
one.

I told our players that if he missed the front end of a one-plus, I
wanted to just go for a two-pointer to tie and I wanted Rex or James or
Ed to take the last shot."

As the teams broke huddle and headed for the Tennessee free throw line,
the students and the diehards really raised the roof, trying to rattle
Nix.  Ed Davender was so sure that Nix would miss, he told Chapman to
take the last shot.  Davender related to Rex that it was his turn since
Davender had hit the game-winner just a few days earlier at Alabama.

The pressure was squarely on Nix.  If he made the first shot, Kentucky
would have to hit a three to send the game into overtime.  If he made
both ends of the one-and-one, the game was almost surely out of
Kentucky's reach.

134

Nix had connected on six of his seven charity tosses as he toed the
line for his most important free throw of the game.  He missed.

Richard Madison pulled down the rebound for UK and fed it out to
Chapman who began his coast-to-coast dash to glory.  Doug Roth, a 6-11
sophomore center for the Vols, moved out to pick up Chapman.  Rex faded
to his left and put up a soft 12-footer that Ed Davender helped
Kentucky close out the 1986-87 regular season with a 75-74 win over the
Oklahoma Sooners.

135 kissed off the glass and into the basket with three seconds left.

The score was knotted 77-77.  Overtime!

The Cats had the momentum now and never trailed in the extra five
minutes, pulling out a 91-84 win.  Eddie Sutton recalled that it was,
"One of the most remarkable comebacks I've ever been associated
with."

The few fans who had toughed it out to the end did, indeed, see a
remarkable comeback.  "Someone told me after the game," Sutton said,
"that our good fans actually left the game and somehow learned that we
had made the comeback, tried to get back in and couldn't."

Even the ending of the Tennessee game was bizarre.  Sutton sent in
Steve Bruce, a walk-on, who went in to kill the final 11 seconds by
dribbling the ball in the backsourt.

Kentucky had six games to go after the pulsating victory over Tennessee
and broke even with three wins and three losses.  The final game of the
regular season saw the Cats end on a high note by defeating a strong
Oklahoma team, 75-74.

The wheels came off as Kentucky headed into postseason play.  The first
game for the Cats in the SEC Tournament came against Auburn, a team UK
had narrowly beaten twice during the regular season.  The third meeting
went to Auburn 79-72, as the Cats got an early trip home to
Lexington.

Kentucky still got a bid to the NCAA Tournament but proved to be no
match for Ohio State, as the Buckeyes prevailed 91-77.  By UK's
standards, an 18-11 season was nothing to write home about, but if you
enjoy watching exciting basketball, as I do, that was really a fun
season.

136

The Benchmark Game I think it was the late Paul "Bear" Bryant who first
came up with the opinion that a tie was like kissing your sister.  The
accomplished coach was describing his frustration on the outcome of a
football game when neither team won or lost but broke even in the
contest.  Following a college basketball team that breaks even over the
course of a season isn't exactly a barrel of fun.  Not usually.  Adolph
Rupp's 1967 team posted a 13-13 record after finishing second in the
nation the previous season and Joe B. Hall's 1974 team who posted the
same record after winning the SEC Championship the prior year, left UK
fans frustrated and disappointed.  Yet Rick Pitino's 1990 team that
went 14-14 caused great rejoicing in Wildcat land.

Following severe NCAA penalties and the transfer of the best UK
players, Pitino was left with only eight scholarship players from which
to rebuild the down-trodden UK program.  While flying across the
Atlantic after the trip to Italy in the summer of 1995, I asked Rick
how he approached that season.  "I just wanted to put in our style of
play that I thought would be beneficial down the road.  I didn't think
in terms of winning and losing.  I was thinking of the future of the
team.  I thought our up-tempo style would be fun for the fans and
interesting to the players we would be re 137

Reggie Hanson, all 6-7 of him, held his own against a much taller LSU
Jiontline and helped the Cats pull off the improbable upset.

138 cruiting.  I thought that would be enough for the first year."

Pitino put in an excruciating conditioning program but, by the time his
preseason practice sessions ended, he realized that seven players would
have to carry the banner for the Wildcats.  "I didn't think you could
play the style of play that we play with so few players.  They were
going to have to play so many minutes," he said.

Pitino's debut as the Kentucky coach saw the Wildcats squeak out a
76-73 win over Ohio U. in Rupp Arena.  He took the Cats to Indianapolis
and played a good Indiana team right down to the wire before losing
71-69.  "I thought then," he said, "that we could be a competitive team
despite a lot of short-comings."  The low point of the season came at
Kansas where the Jayhawks ran wild against the Wildcats, winning
150-95, the worst loss in modern history for a Kentucky team.  Back at
home, Kentucky played heavily favored Louisville on even terms before
losing by seven.

As conference play began, the Cats were winning at home but losing on
the road.  Still, they were 12-10þalready with more wins than anyone
had predictedþwhen Dale Brown brought a fine LSU team to Lexington for
a rematch with the Wildcats.

LSU won the first game that season, down in Baton Rouge in easy fashion
and his Tigers were heavily favored to make it two in a row over the
Cats.  LSU was ranked No.  9 in the nation, was leading the SEC and had
won seven straight games heading into the game at Rupp Arena.  Even
though LSU had coasted to a 94-81 victory in Baton Rouge, there were
plenty of fireworks in that game.  Pitino and Brown almost came to
blows at one point.  Both down played the incident after the game, but
I was there and I really thought the two coaches were going to start
swinging.

The SEC office was so concerned that it made a change in the officiating
 crew for the second game.  The veteran Don Rutledge was
brought in for Paul Andrzejewski, but the game was played without
incident.

The LSU game was to be the biggest of the season for Pitino's first
edition of Wildcats.  A record crowd of 24,301 yelled itself hoarse
even before the opening tip-off.  Jerseys in honor of former 139 UK
coaches Adolph Rupp and Joe B. Hall were unveiled in a ceremony before
the game.  Two former Wildcat greats, Dan Issel and Cotton Nash, were
introduced to the crowd.  Wild hysteria was rampant in Rupp.

Kentucky was a decided underdog.

"I've never believed in moral victories," Pitino recalled.  "I don't
think playing a highly ranked team to a six- or eight-point loss helps
your ball club.  I think you have to play to win.  I thought, and our
players thought, that we could beat LSU."

LSU had an awesomely talented team with two seven-footers, Shaquille
O"Neal and Stanley Roberts, and the best college guard in the country,
Chris Jackson.  Kentucky's trademark had become the three-point shot.

The Wildcats had already set several NCAA records for shooting the
three.

Early in the season sportswriter Billy Reed had named the Wildcats
"Pitino's Bambinos," because the players were so young.  Late in the
year, another sports reporter,John McGill, had changed Bambinos to
Bombinos because of their reliance on the three-point shot.

Talking about going into the LSU game, Pitino laughingly recalled, "One
of the big strengths we had was when the opposing team stepped on the
court, especially a team that had the talent LSU had.  When they
watched Kentucky warm up, they knew they wouldn't have a problem
beating us.  Our psychological edge was big because we were so small
and scrawny.

The other team thought all it had to do was show up to beat us."

Kentucky played its fast-paced style that year with just seven
players.

Billy Reed dubbed them, "the seven men of iron."  Deron Feldhaus and
John Pelphrey were the forwards, Reggie Hanson was the starting center
and Derrick Miller and Sean Woods operated at the guards.  Richie
Farmer and Jeff Brassow provided the only relief.

"Not many people thought we could beat LSU but I felt we had a genuine
shot to beat them and our team felt that way, too.  I knew we would
have some defensive problems because of their tremendous size, but I
thought, on offense, we could do some things that 140

Richie Farmer and the Cats kept Chris Jackson off balance most of the
game, before the LSU sharpshooter heated up in the second half would
hurt them.  I thought it was imperative that we get the early lead.

I was worried that they might go to a zone, but I felt if we could get
in front, they would have to play our game.  We could spread the floor
and make them come out and chase us.  I felt that the fact we were
small was in our favor.  Their big people were going to have to come
out on the floor to guard our forwards.  Pelphrey and Feldhaus were
both good ball handlers and I thought if we could get them to come out
on the floor to pick us up, we were quick enough to backdoor them for
some easy baskets.

I thought the biggest key to our winning the game though, was to make
sure we got the lead and make them play our game."

Rick needn't have worried.  After the two teams traded three

Deron Feldhaus and the rest of the Cats had problems maneuvering inside
against LSU's 7-1

ShaquiBe O"Neal.
Sean Woods had some big baskets against LSU in what many observers
consider to be one of Rick Pitino's biggest wins at Kentucky.

pointers to start the game, the Wildcats took over.  An enthusiastic,
if disbelieving, audience watched the Cats roar to a 23-point lead,
41-18.

The Bayou Bengals seemed totally confused by UK's pressing defense and
began to show some frustration as Roberts batted a ball at one of the
officials and was assessed a technical foul.

LSU had too much talent and too much at stake to roll over 143 and play
dead.  The Tigers roared back with 14 unanswered points to light up the
scoreboard and cut the Wildcat lead to nine, 41-32.  The two teams
swapped baskets the remainder of the first half and Kentucky led,
48-36.

During the halftime intermission, Pitino cautioned his troops that LSU
would make a run.  The Tigers' great little guard, Chris Jackson, had
connected on only one of his seven three-point attempts in the first
half.  Rick feared if they let Jackson get on a roll, he could create
havoc for the Wildcats in the second half.

Shaquille O"Neal got the second half off to a roaring start for LSU
with a thunderous dunk.  Kentucky answered with four quick points.

That was the way the ebb and flow of the second half played out through
much of the game.  LSU would make a run...UK would counter.  The
Tigers closed to within seven, 54-47, then Kentucky pulled away.  The
Bengals closed later to within eight, 67-59, and once again the Cats
pulled away.

Kentucky seemed to be in a comfortable situation with an 87-70 lead
with less than six minutes to play since O"Neal had already fouled
out.

But Pitino's halftime worries were about to happen as Chris Jackson
found his eye.

With 2:46 to play, Jackson led the fast break but pulled up and popped
a three from 20 feet to cut Kentucky's lead to six, the closest LSU had
been since the early minutes of the game.

John Pelphrey and Deron Feldhaus got open on backdoor plays to push the
Cats back with a little breathing room.  But Jackson was by no means
finished.  With 1:12 to go,Jackson drove into the right baseline corner
and with two Kentucky defenders all over him, his three was right on
target.  Kentucky 94, LSU 92.

"We were going to run off some clock and try to force LSU to foul us,"
Pitino recalled.  "In that kind of a situation we wanted our best free
throw shooters in the game.  We had Richie Farmer in there and there's
nobody better at the line when it really counts."  LSU did foul Farmer,
and he went to the line to convert both ends of the one-and-one.

Kentucky 96, LSU 92.

Reggie Hanson, one of six Wildcats to score in doublefigures, slams
home two of his 1I points.

Few photos better depict the gigantic feat Kentucky accomplished by
knockingoffLSU, 100-95.

LSU came down and hurried its shot.  It missed.  Kentucky got the ball
and with Farmer handling the ball most of the time, the Tigers fouled
him again.  Once again Richie was up to the task and made the one and
the bonus.  Kentucky 98, LSU 92.  Jackson came down and fired from 23
feet, his seventh three-pointer of the game, and with 41 seconds left
Kentucky clung to the lead, 98-95.

LSU had to foul quickly and to the Tigers' dismay, the man with the
ball again was Farmer.  Once more, Richie cashed in both ends of the
one and the bonus and that was the old ball game.  Kentucky 100, LSU
95.

Rupp Arena went wild.  The players were happy but weary.  Hanson had
played the full 40 minutes.  Feldhaus had been on the floor for 39
minutes.  LSU's Chris Jackson had a magnificent game with 41 points, but
it wasn't enough to offset UK's balance.  Six of the seven Kentucky
players were in double figures.  Derrick Miller had 29, Feldhaus 24,
Sean Woods scored 12, Hanson 11 and Pelphrey and Farmer scored 10
apiece.

Woods was a big factor in the game.  He played less than three minutes
in the first half because of foul trouble but scored 10 of his 12
points in the second half.  Probably the most telling statistic was
turnovers.

The Cats made only 13 turnovers for the entire game, while LSU,
bothered by UK's swarming press, turned the ball over 27 times.

Kentucky outscored LSU 16-4 off turnovers.

The win over LSU pushed Kentucky's record to 13-10 and four of
Kentucky's last five games were away from home.  The Cats won over
Auburn in Rupp by three but lost all four of the road games to finish
with the 14-14 record.  It was a better record than even the most
optimistic person could have hoped for.  For his coaching magic, Pitino
was named the SEC Coach of the Year and Basketball News named him
national Coach of the Year.  The fans had a ball that season.  Pitino
not only had given them a better season than any expected, but it was
fun to watch the team run and shoot the three-pointers on offense and
on defense the Cats played the press from end line to end line.

Pitino had a lot to talk about in his courtside post-game press
conference after the Cats puXed off the upset of LSU.

Under the penalties handed down by the NCAA, Kentucky was not permitted
to take part in any postseason play, but it was clear that Pitino had
brought the Cats farther more quickly than anyone expected.  He still
looks back on his first Kentucky team with fond memories.

"I think for the fans, the players and for everyone, it was a fun
year.

I had heard that the Kentucky fans had been coming to the games hoping
not to lose instead of hoping to win.  I thought they really got into
the games that year and it certainly was an enjoyable season for me."

Rick thought the win over LSU was the most important game that
season.

"We beat a team that had three NBA draft picks on it and we went into
the game believing we would win it.  I think our fans started believing
that we were going to definitely build the program back up.  What it
showed me was that we were on a quicker path of turning around this
program than even I anticipated.  I thought we could do it if we added
one or two big time recruits, added a little size and depth to the
program.  I thought we could build it back in three years instead of
five years.

There's no question about it, that win over LSU was the benchmark in
our rebuilding program."

What a game!  What a season!  It might have been only a 14-14 year, but
oh my, wasn't it exciting?

Greatest Game Ever?

"Greatest game ever?"  Kentucky had just lost a gut-wrenching 104-103

NCAA Tournament game to Duke in overtime.  Boston sportswriter Bob
Ryan, who was sitting right in front of our broadcasting position, held
up a single sheet of notebook paper with the question scrawled on it.

It had been a devastating defeat for the Wildcats, but I had to admit
it had been a great basketball game.

The Kentucky-Duke game was played on March 28, 1992.  To show just how
big the game was for Kentucky, we have to turn the calendar back three
seasons to 1989.

The NCAA sacked Kentucky with severe penalties, ruling players Eric
Manuel and Chris Mills ineligible to play for the Wildcats.

Kentucky was forbidden to be on television for a year or to play in a
postseason tournament for two years.  LeRon Ellis exercised his option
to transfer to Syracuse and Sean Sutton went to Lexington Community
College for a year before rejoining his dad, Eddie, at Oklahoma State
the following season.  Eddie, of course, had been the coach at Kentucky
during the NCAA investigation.  Sports Illustrated's cover called it
"Kentucky's Shame."

That's the situation Rick Pitino faced when he was brought in to
rebuild Kentucky's devastated program.  He had only eight scholarship
players.  None of them was taller than 6-7.  Reggie Han son and Derrick
Miller were the only players with starting experience.John Pelphrey,
Sean Woods, Deron Feldhaus, Richie Farmer and Jonathan Davis had been
bench warmers and JeffBrassowwas the last recruit Eddie Sutton landed
before his resignationþnot much to get excited about.  After I got to
know Pitino, I told him if he won 10 games with those players he should
be voted Coach of the Year.  He did better than that.  By firing
three-pointers as if they were going out of style, the team finished
with a 14-14 record.

Pitino went back to his native New York to bring in a top player for
the 1990-91 season and Jamal Mashburn immediately stepped into the
starting lineup.  The team posted a 22-6 record and actually finished
with the best record in the Southeastern Conference but because of the
sanctions, could not claim the league championship.  The ban on
postseason play was still in effect.

The piper had been paid as the 1991-92 season got underway.  All the
sanctions were gone and the Wildcats could compete on even terms
again.

The four seniors were the heart of that 1991-92

Kentucky team.  They made up half the squad during Pitino's first
season.  They were an unlikely lot to be the ones to bring the Wildcats
from the ashes, to one of the nation's elite teams, in only three
years.

Sean Woods was in Purgatory during the last Eddie Sutton year for
academic reasons.  John Pelphrey and Deron Feldhaus had been recruited
the year before, but so little was thought of their talents that both
were redshirted.  Richie Farmer came in as a freshman and joined
Pelphrey and Feldhaus on the bench during Kentucky's first losing
season in 62 years in 1989.  Ironically, they started that season by
watching Duke paste the Cats by 25 in the Tip-Off Classic.

When Rick Pitino came on board to rebuild the Kentucky program he
didn't see much in the way of talent to give him great encouragement.

He thought that Reggie Hanson and Derrick Miller were capable of
playing at this level, but he doubted the abilities of the other
players.  Rick had pegged Pelphrey as a smooth-talk 152

Sean Woods had an outstanding offensive game in the East Regional final
against Duke, as he scored 21 points and had nine assists.

153 ing locker room lawyer.  He felt Woods and Feldhaus couldn't
shoot.

He looked upon Farmer as an overweight, pampered high school star who
would rather hunt and fish than pay the price to be a major college
player.

Sutton had been of about the same opinion when he recruited the four.

Feldhaus was the first to sign.  He came aboard early.  He was the son
of a former Wildcat, Allen Sr and had played for his father at Mason
County.  Sutton perceived Deron as a player who could come off the
bench and offer some relief.

Pelphrey came out of high school the same year as Feldhaus and it was
Pelphrey who earned the honor of "Mr. Basketball" that year.  He was
quite a star for Paintsville, but Sutton's staff did not feel he could
play at UK C.M. Newton was vigorously recruiting him at Vanderbilt,
but it was not until Louisville got interested did Kentucky offer him a
scholarship.  John grabbed it immediately.

The next season Farmer came out of Clay County, one of the greatest
players the mountains had ever produced.  He had been All-State for
three straight years.  He had led his team to the state high school
championship.  His senior year, he was named "Mr. Basketball."  Yet
Kentucky didn't come calling.  The UK coaching staff thought he did
not know how to move without the ball and could not play defense.

Richie was such a legend in Eastern Kentucky, the fans insisted he
become a Wildcat.  Sutton relented and offered him a scholarship.

When Pitino first got to Kentucky he was appalled at the team's lack of
physical conditioning.  He brought in Ray "Rock" Oliver to whip the
players into shape.  Oliver brought a drill sergeant's mentality into
the program and he drove the players hard.  Rock did it with an even
hand and, actually, was very popular with the players.

By the time Pelphrey, Feldhaus, Farmer and Woods had reached their
senior year, they had been joined by a sophomore who was to become a
great Kentucky player.  Jamal Mashburn brought star-quality to the
lineup.  Freshman Gimel Martinez had also worked his way into the
starting lineup.  And Dale Brown 154 transferred from a junior college
and certainly made a tremendous contribution to the team.

Mashburn, without question, brought another dimension to the team for
the 1991-92 season and Martinez brought some extra height.  But the
four seniors were the heart and soul of that team.

With Martinez starting at center and Mashburn at forward, three of the
seniors were in the lineup.  Woods was the point guard and, over three
seasons, Pitino had convinced Sean that the job of a point guard was to
make everyone else on the team better.

Farmer started at the two guard.  He had lost 20 pounds since his
sophomore season but still had the guts of a burglar.  Richie was
tremendous in the clutch and welcomed the chance to take the last shot
to decide a game.

Pelphrey started at the forward position opposite Mashburn.  John was
the real leader on that ball club.  Extremely well liked by all the
other players, "Pel" often called team meetings and on the court he was
extremely intelligent and an outstanding passer.

Feldhaus was the sixth man on that team and he filled the role
admirably.  A totally unselfish player, Deron almost always gave the
team a lift when he entered the game.

For the 1991-92 season, all sanctions were gone.  For the first time in
three years the Cats could look forward to postseason play.

It was such a nice and unassuming group that Pitino wondered if it was
made up of the right stuff for much of a run.  "We're just a bunch of
wallflowers," he told me.  "I'm afraid while everybody else is dancing,
our players will be standing in the back of the room."

Kentucky opened the season in the NIT Preseason Tournament.  The
Wildcats waltzed past West Virginia in Rupp Arena, but were shocked in
the next game on their home court by Pittsburgh, 85-67.  Kentucky lost
other games that season, but I thought it was the only time the Cats
went into a game fat-headed and extremely overconfident.

The early exit from the NIT gave Pitino almost two weeks before
the next game and he worked the players hard.  The most important thing
he did was convince the players that they would have to leave it all on
the floor every game to be any good.

That team lost a few but never again did it fail to go down fighting.

Still, UK won 23 and lost only six during the regular season which was
a better record than I thought the team would attain.

The Kentucky players were very excited about heading for Birmingham and
their first postseason tournament in two years.  I flew down with them
on their chartered plane, and several UK fans met us at the Birmingham
Airport.  There was still another group that met the team when it
arrived at the hotel.  Everybody was excited the Cats were about to
embark on postseason play in the SEC Tournament.

First up was Vanderbilt.  His freshman season, Mashburn had felt that
the team belonged to Reggie Hanson.  This season he felt it was the
seniors' team.  He was a completely unselfish player, and midway
through the first half, Pitino had to take him out for a good
butt-chewing for not shooting.  He threatened to keep him out for the
rest of the game.

The threat was short-lived and when Mash went back in, he went to
war.

He ended up with 24 points and 10 rebounds as Kentucky claimed a 76-57
win.  Mash stayed at war for the rest of the postseason.

LSU was next for Kentucky in one of the semifinals.  The Tigers had won
convincingly during the regular season, but this time LSU had to go
without its best player, Shaquille O"Neal.  He had been involved in a
fight against Tennessee and was suspended for the Kentucky game.

Pitino warned his players about the "wounded tiger," feeling the other
players would fight even harder without their superstar.  LSU gave a
great effort and Kentucky had to play hard to come away with an 80-74
victory.

Kentucky would play Alabama in the SEC Tournament championship game.

The Cats hadn't won an official title since 1986.  Their 1988 title had
been vacated in the aftermath of the NCAA sanctions.  Alabama came into
the Kentucky game off a very rugged win over Arkansas and was
favored to measure UK in the final.

It was a tough first half, with Alabama holding a 32-29 lead as
Hollywood Robinson hit a three-pointer just ahead of the buzzer.

As the team left the dressing room for the second half, Mashburn, never
one to be very vocal, called the team together and said, "We've got to
start playing harder."

In what I thought was the team's best offensive half of the season up
to that point, Kentucky overwhelmed Alabama over the next 20 minutes
and won going away,80-54.  Mashburn was named the MVP and Pelphrey
joined him on the All-Tournament Team.

While still in Birmingham, the players learned they would be the No.  2
seed in the East and would open their NCAA play against Old Dominion in
Worcester, Massachusetts.  For the four seniors, their first NCAA
Tournament appearance was a reality.

I always taped Rick's pregame program during the team's walkthrough on
game day.  I had never seen him as nervous as he was the day of the
game with Old Dominion.  Perhaps the team sensed his uneasiness and had
to just go out there and gut out an 88-69 win.  On his post-game radio
program, Rick admitted it was the most nervous he had ever been as a
coach.  I suppose, after the team had come so far, he didn't want to
see them ambushed right out of the starting gate.

The win over Old Dominion moved UK to a second-round game against Iowa
State.  This time both teams shot the lights out, and with all four of
the seniors scoring in double figures, Kentucky finally pulled out a
106-98 decision.  The Wildcats had advanced to the Sweet 16 and the way
I looked at it, anything from there on out was gravy.

The next week Kentucky moved on to the East Regional to play
Massachusetts in Philadelphia's Spectrum.  With Mashburn scoring 30
points, Kentucky came away with an 87-77 win to move into the final
against Duke.  The winner would advance to the Final Four, but most
felt it would be a walk-over for the Blue Devils.

Duke was the defending national champion.  The Blue Devils 157

Jamal Mashburn came up big, although his 28 points against Duke in the
regional championship weren't quite enough.

came into the game against Kentucky ranked No.  1 in the nation.  Only
Pitino and his players felt they had a chance.  Rick noted that Duke
was bigger and more talented.  He felt the only advantage his team had
was that no one was in better physical shape than the Wildcats.  He
also felt that he needed to put in a new defense for 158 the Duke
game.

Kentucky had full-court pressed its way to the Elite Eight, but Pitino
was fearful against a team with Duke's size and speed, all of his
players would foul out.

He decided to pick up full-court, but once the ball passed the center
stripe, the Cats would drop back into a 2-3 zone.  Pitino liked the way
his players were approaching the game.  The day before, at a press
conference, Richie Farmer had said of Duke, "We respect em, but we
don't fear em."

Nobody, of course, expected one of the greatest college games ever
played, but that's exactly what happened.  Pelphrey got the scoring
started with a three-pointer.  After Woods connected from the field,
treys by Pel and Mashburn, put the Cats in front 11-6.  Kentucky's lead
grew to eight after Martinez hit a three, 20-12.  That was the biggest
lead of the game for the Cats and by halftime Duke was in front by
five, 50-45.

With Pelphrey having committed three fouls, Pitino started Feldhaus in
the second half.  Duke began to slowly inch away from the Cats until
the Blue Devils led by 12, 67-55.  Martinez had already fouled out and
with 11:08 to go, Pitino called a timeout.

Rick told his players they were going to abandon the zone and now
unleash their man-to-man press the full 94 feet of the court.  He said,
"The press is going to take its toll.  We're going to win this game."

What followed was the best basketball game I ever saw.

The level of play by both teams had been high but both teams now turned
it up a notch.  After the timeout, Kentucky ran off the next eight
points on a closein shot by Dale Brown and two three-pointers by
Mashburn.

Let the game begin!

Duke, with its great talent and tradition, fought back, but the team's
frustration was most evident when Christian Laettner put his foot in
the stomach of UK freshman Aminu Timberlake, who was lying helpless on
the floor.  The officials tagged Laettner with a technical foul.

There was less than six minutes left to play when Kentucky finally
caught the Blue Devils at 81-81, on Woods' three-point shot.

159

Although this wasn't the" shot, Christian LaetSr had plenty of key
baskets that helped Duke survive furious Cat rally.

Two free throws by Grant Hill pushed Duke back on top,83-81.

Mashburn answered to tie it at 83-all with a drive to the basket.

Duke pushed the lead out to three points but Feldhaus broke for the
basket and Pelphrey hit him with a perfect pass to cut the Duke lead to
one.  Dale Brown's three-pointer pushed Kentucky to a two-point lead,
89-87.  Duke, scoring on a jump shot by Brian Davis tied it yet
again.

Woods hit a pair of free throws for Kentucky and Laettner added a pair
from the charity line for Duke.  After a UK turnover, Thomas Hill's
jumper pushed Duke ahead 93-91.  Kentucky was up to the challenge.

Pelphrey missed with a jump shot but Feldhaus got the rebound and
twisted like a pretzel as he got it back up and in to knot the count at
93-all.  Bobby Hurley missed an off-balance jumper and it was going to
overtime.  Lordy, how much could the old ticker take?

The game lost none of its intensity as the extra five minutes began.

As he had done at the outset of the game, Pelphrey connected for a
three to get the Cats away to the lead.

Pitino had warned his players to guard against Duke's three-pointers,
but Hurley let one fly and missed.  Grant Hill took the long rebound
and pitched it back out to Hurley.  This time the guard was right on
target to tie at 96-96.  Pelphrey fired in a basket for Kentucky and
Laettner canned a pair of free throws for Duke and it was even,
98-98.

Woods made a beautiful move to the basket, but missed the shot and Duke
got the rebound.  Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski called a timeout.  Only 54
seconds remained.

With less than a minute to play, the score tied, every possession,
every play would be crucial.  Pitino told his forces that Duke would go
to Laettner.  He wanted his players to double down on him but not to
foul.

Duke worked the ball to their star and with a crowd of blueshirted
Kentuckians grabbing at the ball, Laettner rose for jump shot that
kissed off the glass and into the net.  It was the most difficult shot
he had made the entire game, and it put Duke up by two, 100-98.

Kentucky came down court and worked the ball around the perimeter until
Mashburn spotted an opening along the baseline and he went for it.

Mash put up a short bank shot that was good.  Antonio Lang was beaten
on the play and fouled Mashburn.  After Mash converted the free throw,
Kentucky led again, 101-100.  Kentucky called a timeout with 19.7
seconds left.

Pitino told the players that they would not call a timeout if Duke
scored.  Kentucky was operating well against the Blue Devils' defense
and he did not want Duke to have a chance to change defenses during a
timeout.  He again told his players to double down on Laettner who
would very likely take the shot.

Duke did work the ball to Laettner and Mashburn dropped back to double
the Duke All-American.  Unfortunatelyj in trying to strip the ball,
Mash committed his fifth foul, and with 14 seconds left, Laettner went
to the line for two shots.  He made both to push Duke back on top,
102-101.

Pitino inserted Farmer for Mashburn.  All four seniors were now on the
floor.

As Kentucky brought the ball down court, Pitino changed his mind and
called a timeout with 7.8 seconds left.  This time he told Woods to
penetrate the middle and if Duke picked him up, dish the ball out to
the wing.  Rick felt Kentucky could not stop Duke from scoring with any
time left on the clock.  He wanted to take the last shot.  "I wanted to
win or lose the game on the last possession," he said.

Farmer passed the ball inbounds to Woods, who gave Hurley a head fake
and ran past him to the key.  Heading down the lane, Woods saw Laettner
switch over to help out defensively, but he was too far into his move
to stop now.  He rose for hisjump shot as the 6-11

Laettner tried to block it.  Somehow Sean got it away and it hit above
the rim and banked in.

Kentucky had the lead 103-102.

The Duke players all seemed to be calling timeout.  The clock showed
2.1 seconds remaining.

There was no secret what Duke would do.  With so little time remaining
and with the Blue Devils having to cover the length of the court, there
would be a long pass.  Almost surely, it would go to Laettner.

The problem was Kentucky's.  Pitino pondered whether to put a defensive
man on the Duke player who would make the inbounds pass, or double team
Laettner.  Laettner was four inches taller than 162

Sean Woods hit what seemed to be the game winning basket that gave
Kentucky a 103-102 lead with 2.1 seconds left.

Kentucky's tallest player on the court.  Martinez and Mashburn were on
the bench with five fouls.  Pelphrey and Feldhaus, both at 6-7, were
the only players he had with any height.  Pitino decided to put the two
men on Laettner.

For Duke, the pass had to be absolutely perfect.  Laettner had to make
the shot.

Grant Hill, a superb athlete, took the ball out of bounds.

Laettner lined up on the side of the floor.  As Hill uncorked the long
pass that traveled 75 feet, Laettner broke into the top of the key.

Pelphrey went for the ball but the bigger man came down with it.

Feldhaus was behind Laettner.  The Duke star faked right, put down a
dribble and turned to his right for the jump shot.  It was perfect.

Duke had won 104-103 in overtime.

The Kentucky players were devastated.  Duke's coach, Mike Krzyzewski,
was a gracious and classy man.  He saw the devastation on Farmer's
face.

"Just looking at his face, there was no way I could be celebrating," he
said.  Krzyzewski went to Farmer.  "I'm sorry Richie," he said.  "I'm
so sorry."

Back in the UK dressing room, Rick tried to tell the players how proud
he was of them.  He brought out the old Sports Illustrated cover that
shouted, "Kentucky's Shame."  He told them how they had brought the
Kentucky program back.  He tried everything he could think of to try
and lift their spirits.  "The harder I tried, the more they wept," he
said.

At courtside, I was signing off on my final UK broadcast after a
39-year run.  I looked up and Coach K signaled he would like to say
something to the UK listeners.  "They were absolutely sensational," he
said of the Kentucky players.  "I feel bad for them.  I hope you
believe that."

"Greatest game ever?"  That's what Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe had
scribbled on a sheet of paper and held up to me.  I was in too much
shock to give Bob much of an answer that night, but I'll answer him
now.

It was the greatest game I ever saw.  The "wallflowers" had danced a
beautiful dance.

164

A Season of Thrills The 1993-94

Kentucky team had more than its share of thrills.

Certainly, the 31-point comeback against LSU was the highlight of the
season.  That history-making game was so remarkable that it will be the
trademark of that team and that miraculous Wildcat victory deserves its
own chapter.  While it would be impossible to top that game, there were
other exciting moments to that Kentucky season.

Personally, the most memorable part of the season was the trip to
Hawaii.  During the summer of 1993, Rick Pitino had invited Frances and
me to go along with the team as his guests.  The following December, we
were winging our way westward to Hawaii for the Maui Classic.

I had been away from the broadcasts for almost two years and I don't
think I realized just how much I missed being around Pitino and the
team.  My colleagues sometimes think I'm odd, but I enjoy watching
practice almost as much as watching the game.  I really get a kick out
of looking on as a coach puts in the game plan, then watching during
the game to see how that plan works out.  I went to every practice the
team had in Maui.  I remember that first one.  The team had its own bus
for the tournament and its own special driver.  This man named Joe was
very familiar with the Kentucky 165 program.  Even though he was a
native of Maui, Joe had gone to college at Eastern Kentucky University,
in Richmond, and he had even tried out for Roy Kidd's football team.

Joe drove the team to this small high school gym that was located up on
a hill overlooking Lahaina, the town where the tournament was held.

While the team was warming up during drills before practice, Rodrick
Rhodes went in for a thunderous dunk and that glass backboard shattered
all over the floor in a zillion pieces.

The players didn't know whether to laugh or get set for some sharp
words from Pitino.  The Kentucky coach ignored the whole thing.  Since
the gym had only two baskets, Pitino simply moved the team to the other
end of the court and practice went on as usual.

The Wildcats' first game in the Maui Classic was against the Texas
Longhorns.  The game was close early, but Kentucky pulled away to win
easily, 86-61.

Ohio State was next on the agenda, and with Travis Ford and Tony Delk
combining for 50 points, the Cats waltzed, 100-88.

Rick invited Frances and me to join the team for dinner after the
game.

We sat with Rick and his wife Joanne, Father Bradley and Bill
Keightley.

The Cats were to face an outstanding Arizona team for the championship
and Rick was especially concerned with the guard tandem of Khalid
Reeves and Damon Stoudamire.  Pitino felt the two were the best pair of
starting guards in all of college basketball.  "They both can kill you
with the three," he said, "and they both can take you one-on-one and
beat you."

Kentucky fans follow the team anywhere it goes and without question,
the UK fans far outnumbered those from any of the other teams in the
tournament.  It was mostly a blue-clad crowd that packed into the
Lahaina Civic Center as Kentucky faced Lute Olson's undefeated Arizona
team.  Two teams that liked to run and gun began a race-horse type of
game that turned into a classic.

Kentucky was quicker out of the starting gate and the Cats raced to an
early 19-12 lead.  With Stoudamire having a sensational first half,
including four baskets from three-point range, the 166

Travis Ford earned most valuable player honors at the Maui Classic and
SEC Tournament to highlight a memorable senior campaign.

167

The Kentucky bench savors a soon-to-be title as the clock winds down in
the championship game of the SEC Tournament.

Wildcats were unable to put it away.  Still, Kentucky was ahead by
eight at the intermission, 49-41.

The Cats tightened their defense on Stoudamire during the second half
and he was able to fire only one three-point shot that was wide of the
mark.  But Reeves got on track and kept Arizona right in the hunt.  It
was his three-pointer with 6:25 left in the game that gave Arizona its
first lead.  From there until the final buzzer it was a dogfight.

With only 1:25 to play, and Kentucky clinging to a 91-90 lead, Tony
Delk was suffering severe leg cramps in the hot-box of a gym and
Kentucky called a timeout.  Jeff Brassow was sent into the game for the
ailing Delk.

The Cats put the ball in play and, as the shot clock wound down, Rhodes
took a shot that was off-target but Brassow came down with the
rebound.

The officials went over to the sideline and watched a video tape replay
and came to the conclusion that Rhodes' shot had not touched the rim
and that the shot clock had run out on the Wildcats.  Arizona was
awarded the ball out of bounds.  Reeves worked the ball downcourt, and
as he drove off the left side of the key, Rhodes reached in and was
called for the foul.  Reeves converted on both free throws and Arizona
moved into the lead, 92-91.  Only 5.5 seconds remained in the game.

Kentucky had to move the ball the length of the court and get off the
shot.  It would have to come quickly.  Rhodes and Brassow broke to the
wings.  The ball came to Rhodes and he went streaking down the right
side of the court.  As the clock was about to run out, Rod let a long
three-pointer fly.  It was no good, but Brassow came racing in, and
with one-tenth of a second left, he tipped it in to give Kentucky a
heart-stopping, 93-92 victory.

"There wasn't time to try to run a play," Brassow was saying
recently.

"When Rod got the ball he was running down the right side.  I knew he
had to take the last shot so I ran for the basket down the left side of
the floor.  The shot came off to the left side and I just happened to
be in the perfect spot.  I knew there wasn't enough time to do anything
but tip it.  Fortunately, it went in just as the horn sounded."

All hell broke loose.  Kentucky fans were charging from the 169 stands
toward the playing floor.  The players were jumping up and down and
hugging each other and the usually cool Pitino came charging on the
court like a bull.  "I thought he was going to tackle me," Brassow
laughed.

Ford had a terrific tournament and was named the Maui MVP, but that one
game belonged to Brassow.  "It was the most exciting game for me
personally in my career at Kentucky," Brassow said.  "There were maybe
better team efforts like the comeback against LSU or making it to the
Final Four, but, personally, that was my biggest thrill.  I'll never
forget it as long as I live."

The 1993-94 season was a bizarre one.  It had more than its share of
strange eventsþof highs and lows.  One of the low points came in the
SEC opener in Rupp Arena against Vanderbilt.  It changed the Kentucky
team for the rest of the season.  The Cats won handily, 107-82, but, in
the first half, the starting UK center, Rodney Dent, went down with an
injury that was to end his college career.  Dent, the man his teammates
called "Moon" was Kentucky's only big, strong inside player at 6-11,
240 pounds.  He was the most consistent scorer inside and he had the
muscle to force the opponents' big people out of the post with his
defense.  To Pitino's credit, he was upbeat about the Cats' future
without Dent, but almost every good center feasted on UK the rest of
the campaign.

Dent's misfortune took away some of the glitter from a remarkable
record Ford set in that game.  Travis went eight-for-eight from the
free throw line to give him 46 consecutive free throws.  This broke the
old UK record of 40, which had been held by Jim Master.  The next game
against Notre Dame, Travis broke the SEC record of 47 which was held by
Vanderbilt's Phil Cox, a Kentuckian from Harlan County.  Trav's 50
consecutive free throws is the conference record.  Ironically, it was
at the free throw line that Ford enjoyed his most shining moment of the
season and it was also at the free throw line he suffered his greatest
embarrassment.

There's an old cliche that goes "what goes around, comes around."

In the 1970s, Kentucky and Tennessee were locked in a 170

I tough game in Memorial Coliseum.  One of the key plays happened when
the Vols' outstanding player, Ernie Grunfeld, shot two free throws,
making both, that should have been taken by a teammate with less talent
at the charity stripe.Just how much bearing Grunfeld's antics had on
the outcome of the game is debatable, but Tennessee won.

Kentucky players used the same bad judgement in the return game with
Vanderbilt in 1994, this time in Nashville, not once but twice.

Gimel Martinez volunteered to shoot free throws for Jared Prickett and
Ford suggested to Walter McCarty that he take the shots that should
have gone to Andre Riddick.  Kentucky won the game 77-69.  Travis
compounded the problem when he made a joke of it in a post-game
interview with a reporter.

When Pitino learned of the indiscretion, he was livid.  I was really
proud of the UK coach who insisted that integrity was more important
than victory.  He suspended Ford, Martinez and Prickett for the next
game, which was a very important SEC battle against Tennessee in
Knoxville.

With only eight players, the Wildcats fought and clawed their way to a
77-73 decision.  It was one of the most courageous efforts ever by a
Kentucky team.

I still go to most of the Kentucky home games and from time to time I
like to go by the dressing room after the game.  It was during that
season that Pitino said to me, on one occasion, that it was the hardest
team to coach that he had ever had.  He didn't elaborate, but I felt it
was a team that never really did totally come together.  Anybody in his
right mind would know Mashburn would be missed, but I think his
departure hurt the other players as well as just losing his magnificent
talent.  I thought his absence especially hurt Ford and Prickett.

With Mash down in the paint, opponents couldn't concentrate on stopping
Travis out on the perimeter.  Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson made no
bones about it.  He said that Ford was the head of that Kentucky team
and "if you cut off the head, the body will die."  Travis was a marked
man without Pitino had a great asset in Travis Ford, who served as a
very capable floor general throughout his career.

172

Mashburn to take off the pressure.  I thought too, that without Mash,
Prickett was a marked man down inside and he didn't have the kind of
year he had the previous season as a freshman.  With Mashburn turning
pro after his junior campaign and Dent's loss midway through the
1993-94 season, it was too much to overcome.

Even though that was an excellent UK team, it lacked that special
ingredient to win a national championship.

The Cats went to South Carolina to close out the regular season.

The Gamecocks had won only three league games, and all the Wildcats had
to do was win to gain the SEC's East Division Championship and the
accompanying No.  1 seed in the league tournament.  With a lethargic
Wildcat performance, South Carolina upset Kentucky 75-74.  So much for
Kentucky's tournament chances.  Oh ye of little faith.

Pitino has been a master at getting his teams ready for SEC Tournament
games and this was to be no exception.  With Tony Delk pulling the
trigger for 29 points, the Cats rolled over Mississippi State 95-76, to
set up a rematch with the nation's top-ranked team, Arkansas.

The tournament was being played in The Pyramid in Memphis and Kentucky
found itself in an unusual situation.  With Arkansas located just
across the river, the Razorback fans outnumbered those in blue.  The
Hogs had beaten Kentucky 90-82 in Rupp Arena during the regular season
and came into the SEC Tournament ranked No.  1 in the nation.

The Cats set a tournament record with 16 three-pointers and proved too
much for Arkansas, 90-78, to move into the final against Florida.

The two teams had split their games during the season with Florida
winning at home by two and Kentucky gaining a threepoint win in Rupp
Arena.  In Memphis it was all Kentucky as the Cats prevailed, 73-60.

Ford, Brassow and Delk made the All-Tournament Team with Travis being
named MVP.  It was Pitino's third SEC Tournament title in a row.

Arkansas and Florida would go on 173

The 73-60 win in the championship game of the SEC Tournament made it
three in a row for the wildcats under Rick Pitino.

to the NCAA Tournament with both advancing to the Final Four and
Arkansas winning the championship.

Kentucky began play in the NCAA Tournament in St. Petersburg,
Florida.

The Cats showed opening-game jitters in the first half against
Tennessee State, but caught fire in the final twenty 174 minutes and
pulled away to an easy 83-70 victory.

Andre Riddick had his best game as a Wildcat, scoring 22 points and
dominating TSU's outstanding center, Carlos Rogers.

Kentucky was the higher seed and favored to measure Marquette in the
second round of the NCAA Tournament.  The Warriors had a huge front
line, and Kentucky always had trouble after Dent's injury when an
opponent had big, talented inside players.  Marquette proved the point
again as Kentucky shot miserably 175

The 1994

SEC Tournament title, the third during his UK career, was especially
gratipyingfor Jeff Brassow, who overcame injuries again and again to
comeback and contribute at guard.

from the perimeter and the Warriors sent Kentucky home early.

Marquette won the game, 75-63.

After going to the Final Four the previous season, Kentucky fans were
disappointed with the Cats' quick exit from the NCAA.  Still, looking
back, the 1993-94 season was a very good year.  UK 176 won 27 and lost
seven, a record any team would point to with pride.  That team won the
SEC Tournament for the third straight year.  And, oh my, what thrills
it gave us along the way: the tip-in to win the Maui Classic, the
phenomenal 31-point comeback to beat LSU, Travis Ford setting the
consecutive free throw record, and the big free throw "switcheroo" at
Vanderbilt.

Four seniors who brought a great deal to the UK program departed after
that season.  "Moon" Dent left prematurely following his injury and his
loss was felt the remainder of the campaign.  Ford, Martinez and
Brassow completed their eligibilityþFord, after transferring from
Missouri and undergoing knee surgery, came back for two marvelous
seasons with Kentucky.  He was one of the premier point guards in the
game and as a junior was very instrumental in helping the Cats get to
the Final Four.

Gimel Martinez lacked the bulk Kentucky needed inside, but he had great
hands and was a good shooter from inside, outside and from the free
throw line.  What can I say about Jeff Brassow?  He was forced to
undergo knee surgery three times.  Each time he came back to play.

Sure, he played with pain but he also played with courage.  Jeff was at
his best when the chips were down.

That 1993-94 season was one of my favorites.  Those players certainly
gave us enough thrills for a dozen campaigns.

177

The Miracle of Fat Tuesday The date was February 15, 1994.  It was Fat
Tuesday, the last day of carnival before the beginning of Lent,
normally a day for celebration in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

It was a situation that Richard Allen Pitino had experienced many times
in his almost 17 years as a basketball coach.  His team was trailing at
halftime.  Kentucky had trailed by as many as 21 points in the first
half but had cut the margin to 16 by intermission and Pitino was
actually feeling good about the Wildcats' chances as he trailed them
into the dressing room in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center on the
Louisiana State University campus.  He felt LSU was shooting too
quickly and had been fortunate in making some bad shots.  "I thought at
that point, there was no problem to our winning the game," he said.

Just before sending the team back out for the second half, Pitino gave
the players the age-old admonition to take their time, not to try to
catch up all at once but to show some patience.

If Pitino's belief that those bad LSU shots would stop falling, it
certainly wasn't apparent as the second half got underway.  The Bayou
Bengals were on fire, and they almost doubled their halftime lead,
stretching it to 31 points.

Pitino felt LSU had been in what he called a "zone" in the first 179
half and that the Tigers would tail off as the game went along.

With LSU leading, 50-37, the sky fell in on the Wildcats as the Tigers
ran off 18 straight points.

After LSU extended the lead to 20 points at 57-37, Pitino called
timeout to try and stop the bleeding.  He did his best to look
confident, feeling that if the coach lacked confidence, the team
certainly would.

LSU continued to connect for three-pointers and, shortly after the
timeout, Travis Ford was so frustrated he committed an intentional
foul.

That resulted in two points from the free throw line.  On the ensuing
inbounds play, Jamie Brandon arched in a threepointer.  At 62-37, a
25-point lead now for LSU, Pitino called another timeout.  "I just
tried to keep a superior attitude," Pitino said.

Rick Pitino took many a long look skyward during the first 25 minutes of
the game in Baton Rouge.

180

"I wanted them to know I still believed in them."

LSU struck for three more field goals to complete an 18-0 run and push
the score to 68-37, a 31-point lead.  No team in basketball history had
overcome such a lead on the road and it looked like an LSU blowout.

"I remember sitting there on the bench right at that time," Jeff
Brassow recalled.  Ford had left the game after the intentional foul
and Brassow turned to his teammate and said, "I can't believe this is
happening.

This shouldn't be happening to us."  Only 15 minutes and 34 seconds
remained to be played.  The stage was set for one of the greatest
comebacks in sports history.

Rodrick Rhodes was fouled driving to the basket and converted both free
throws.  Chris Harrison banked his jump shot off the board and the next
time downcourt, after Ford missed from the outside, Andre Riddick put
in the rebound and Kentucky had cut the LSU lead to 26 points, 68-43.

Tiger coach Dale Brown, called a timeout.

At the UK bench, Pitino told his team, "Look, we've cut a little
off.

Let's cut a little more off and make em call another timeout."

It was only 1:47 later that LSU did call another timeout but this time
it was not signaled by Coach Brown.  Kentucky had really picked up its
defense, and when Andre Owens was caught in a twoman-trap near
midcourt, he called for the timeout to keep from losing the ball.  The
score was LSU 70, Kentucky 48.  The Tigers led by 22 with 12:22 left to
play.

Pitino continued to implore his troops to chip away at the LSU lead a
little at a time.  "I told them," he said, "to try to get it within 15
points and that we would get one of our runs going."

The Kentucky run was about to start.  Rhodes drove in for a basket.

Harrison, back in the game, was well outside the key and the LSU
defense, perhaps not knowing that Harrison's forte was shooting, backed
off him.  Chris arched in a perfect rainbow from behind the three-point
arc to cut the Tiger lead to 17, 70-53 with 11:27 to play.  "We had
really been missing the three-pointers," Brassow pointed out, "and when
Chris hit one, I think that really changed the momentum of the game.

We seemed to seize the tempo from LSU."

After Brandon cashed in a pair of free throws, McCarty fired in a
three.  Gimel Martinez tried his hand from three-point range but
missed.

Tony Delk grabbed the rebound on the right side of the basket, then
slipped a short pass to McCarty on the other side for an easy layup.

Apparently LSU had little in its scouting report on Harrison, because
once again the Tiger defense backed off and Chris fired in another
three-pointer.  UK had outscored the Tigers 18-2 over a span of a
little more than four minutes and had cut 20 points off the seemingly
insurmountable 31-point LSU lead.  The Tigers still held the advantage,
72-61, with 9:52 left in the game.

After LSU pushed the lead back up to 16, it was time for Brassow to do
his number.

Jeff Brassow was a fifth-year senior on that team that was destined to
participate in one of sports' greatest comebacks.  He had been the last
player recruited by Eddie Sutton and was the only player on the squad
that Pitino had not brought to Kentucky.  Brassow was looking forward
to the game against LSU.  "I've always loved that gym," Jeff related.

"Even though the team hasn't fared very well at LSU through the years,
I've always been able to score well there.  It's a good place for me to
play.

I've had some of my better games down there."

After Ronnie Henderson had hit one of his eight baskets from behind the
three-point line, LSU moved ahead, 77-61.  On the next trip downcourt,
Brassow found himself left alone by the LSU defense and he broke for
the basket and kissed it in off the glass to cut the advantage to
77-63.

After another LSU field goal, Brassow found himself wide open in the
left corner and he fired in a perfect three to cut the lead to 13 as
LSU held a dwindling 79-66 lead.  After an LSU miss, McCarty rebounded
the ball and passed it out to Travis Ford.  He slipped a short pass to
Brassow and after one dribble,Jefffired in another three from
outside.

The margin now was down to 10, 79-69.

182

AJter many sideline anwersations, the Kentucky players responded and
the improbable became reality.

183

LSU pushed the lead back to 13 with three points from the free throw
line.  Rodrick Rhodes checked back in, committed two quick fouls, but
then hit his only three-pointer of the game.  Taking a pass from Ford
in the backcourt, Rhodes moved behind a perfect screen set by Martinez
and cut the LSU lead back to 10, 82-72.

The Tigers were never to lead by more than 10 points again, even though
they did lead by 10 on two later occasions.  The last lead by that
margin came with 3:57 to play, 88-78.

Martinez was fouled after rebounding a missed LSU free throw.  He made
the first but missed the second.  Delk came up with the rebound and the
Cats worked the perimeter until Ford got open for a three out of the
deep left corner.  LSU's lead was reduced to six, 88-82, with 3:41 to
play.

LSU built the lead to nine and was leading by seven when Brassow got in
on the action again.  Brandon was bringing the ball upcourt for the
Tigers when Brassow slapped the ball away.  Riddick came up with the
ball and fed it upcourt to Harrison.  Chris found Brassow open on the
left side and Jefffired in still another threepointer to cut the lead to
four, 91-87.

Clarence Ceasar cashed in two free throws to move LSU back to a 93-87
lead and it was time for Brassow to continue his act.

"I was feeling really good about my shot by that time," he said, and
we needed to be putting up good shots.  Travis and I had a little
screen and roll play up at the top and I was going to try to get Travis
open for the three.  The LSU players got caught a little bit in their
switch and Travis switched the ball to me and I just stepped back
behind the NBA line and let it go."  Brassow's extremely long
three-point try was right on target and Kentucky was within three,
93-90.

LSU was struggling at the free throw line.  Everybody that is, except
Ceasar.  He fired in two more to make it 95-90.  Tony Delk got a double
screen on the left side and found himself wide open for a three.

Good!

Kentucky was within two, 95-93.

Both teams went cold.  Both teams made turnovers.  Brassow 184

A spirited posSgame celebration was in order after the Catsfinished
their unprecedented rallypom 31 points down to beat IMiU, 99-95.

went to the free throw line but missed both tosses.  After a couple of
tips at the basket, the ball went out of bounds but was touched last by
LSU.  Only 51 seconds remained.

Ford drove into the middle but lost the ball and once again LSU touched
it before it went out of bounds.  Brassow put the ball in play from
under the Kentucky basket.  The Cats worked it around the perimeter.

Delk drove down the middle and pitched it out to McCarty in the left
corner.

He was right in front of the UK 185

With 19 seconds left, Walter McCarty capped the comeback when he hit the
biggest three-pointer of his career to give Kentucky a 9695 lead.

186 bench and Pitino yelled to McCarty "Take it, Walt.  And count
it."

McCarty drilled a three and Kentucky took the lead for the first time
since Andre Riddick's free throw in the first minute of the game made
it 1-0

Wildcats.  Now they led 96-95, but there were still 19 seconds to
play.

LSU brought the ball over midcourt and called a timeout with 11.5
seconds to play.

Gathered around the UK bench, Brassow remembered, "Coach Pitino was
looking me dead in the eye and I could tell he was thinking if he
should take me out for defensive purposes.  As it turned out, it was my
man who tried to take me one-on-one."  Brandon drove with Brassow
guarding him every step of the way.  The shot was no good and Delk was
fouled after taking the rebound.  With just over four seconds left,
Tony hit one of two to give the Cats a 97-95 lead.

Pitino put Jared Prickett on Ceasar, who took the ball out of bounds.

Ceasar threw a long pass to Sean Gipson at the LSU free throw line and
when Martinez challenged the pass, Gipson fell down with the ball and
was called for steps.  That, for all intents and purposes, was the old
ball game.  Ford hit two free throws to end the game and Kentucky had
finished one of the most miraculous comebacks in sports history with a
99-95 win over LSU.

"We were just screaming and yelling when we got back to the dressing
room," Brassow said.  "It was a big win for us.  We had come back from
31 points down and we had lost two in a row going into that game.  We
were giving each other high fives.  We just could not believe what we
had done.  It's something I know I'll always remember."  So will all
Kentucky fans.

That night, I did something I had never done before.  The game had been
telecast on ESPN, and the network was going to replay the game at 3:30
a.m. I set my alarm for 4 a.m. and got up and savored that second half
all over again.  It wasn't nearly as nerve-racking the second time,
knowing the outcome ahead of time.

187

Back From the Dead, Twice Rodrick Rhodes broke my heart.  Not because
he went to the free throw line for two shots with one second to play
and the score tied and he missed them both, but what caring soul could
fail to feel great compassion for a young man thrust into such a
pressure-packed situation.

That sticks out especially in my memory of one of the greatest games
ever played.

Kentucky fans, as they always do, looked ahead to a great season as the
Wildcats suited up for the 1994-95 season.  True, four seasoned
veterans had departed, but four starters would be returning.  Travis
Ford would be missed as the starting point guard and so would valuable
reserves Jeff Brassow, Gimel Martinez and Rodney Dent, who missed the
last half of the season with an injury.  Joining eight lettermen, Rick
Pitino would welcome Mark Pope, who sat out a season after transferring
from the University of Washington, plus freshmen Antoine Walker, Allen
Edwards and Scott Padgett.  Walker, in particular, was bringing in very
impressive credentials as one of the best freshmen in the country and
Pitino was even comparing him to All-American Jamal Mashburn when
Mashburn was a freshman.

If there's a bigger or better rivalry in college basketball than the
Kentucky-Arkansas series, it has escaped detection.  The two South 189
eastern Conference powers met in Fayetteville on January 29, 1995, and
if anybody was disappointed in the caliber of play in that one, it
hasn't been recorded.  Scotty Thurman's three-point basket with 11
seconds left in the game gave Arkansas a thrilling 94-92 win over the
Cats in a game many observers thought was the best game of the season
played anywhere in the country.  It was filled with intensity.  It saw
first one team make a run, then the other, and the emotion was sky-high
from start to finish.  Tony Delk was magnificent in defeat, scoring a
career-high 31 points.  Arkansas won the day but Kentucky won the
regular season SEC championship.  The two teams would meet again in the
conference tournament and that game, if anything, was even better than
the first.

To set up the rematch, Kentucky had to beat Auburn and Florida in the
SEC Tournament.  The Cats won both and looked very impressive in
dispatching the Tigers and the Gators to move into the title game
against Arkansas.

Even though people were still talking about the great game the two
teams had played during the regular season, Pitino said it was not
really a great game.  "It was a high-scoring, entertaining game," he
said, "and right after the game I thought it had been a terrific
game.

But after watching the film, I saw that both teams had played great
offensively but both had spent all their energy on the offensive end.

Neither team played well defensively.  For that reason I would not say
it was a great game."

During a tournament there is very little time to prepare for an
opponent, but both Kentucky and Arkansas knew each other intimately.

Pitino told his players that they must concentrate on stopping Corliss
Williamson inside and Scotty Thurman from the perimeter.  He also
talked about what the Razorbacks like to do.  "They like to run out on
the break and they will give you a chance to get the offensive
rebounds.  We had to get those.  We also had to knock down our shots.

We were a very inconsistent shooting team so we needed to work the ball
inside and if there was nothing there, we had to kick it back out and
hit from the perimeter."

190

Tony Delk's drive and basket kicked off a second-half Kentucky rally,
which saw the Cats co1the back and send the gawne into overti1the.

Both Kentucky and Arkansas had large contingents among better than
30,000 fans who packed into Atlanta's Georgia Dome for the rematch.

Everyone was expecting another classic between these two adversaries
and the Hogs and Cats lived up to the advance billing.

Pitino has always insisted that it doesn't matter which players start
for the Wildcats, but the ones who are playing the best will be in the
game at the end.  He had more or less settled on a starting lineup of
Rodrick Rhodes and Walter McCarty at the forwards, Andre Riddick at
center and Tony Delk and Jeff Sheppard at the guards.  But the biggest
reason the Cats were performing so well at that time was the big
contribution Rick was getting from his bench.  Freshman Antoine Walker
was having a superb tournament and had come off the bench to lead the
Cats in scoring the previous night against Florida.  Mark Pope had done
the same against the Gators to lead UK in rebounding.  Anthony Epps
was giving Kentucky good leadership when he came in to play the point
guard position.  Jared Prickett played well and Chris Harrison had
become the player to come in when the Cats hit a shooting slump and get
them going again.

The crowd was roaring in great anticipation of the game as the two
teams went at it.  Kentucky took the early lead when Riddick was fouled
trying to get off a shot and the senior center, not exactly the world's
best free throw shooter, went to the line and made both to push the
Cats ahead 2-0.  The game was only nine seconds old.

That was the last time UK would celebrate until very late in the
game.

The Hogs took the game over and with nine minutes left in the first
half they had pushed the lead out to 19 points, 35-16.

"Arkansas felt that they could beat us," Pitino remembered.  "They came
out with great confidence because the prior year we had beaten them in
the SEC Tournament and they were going to make sure that didn't happen
again.  They really came out with great fire in their belly."

192

True, the Hogs were playing excellent basketball at that point, but
Pitino insists that, even though his team was trailing by 19, the Cats
weren't close to panic.  "In our style of play we always come back.

Arkansas is not a ball control team and they'll let us back in the game
if we make some shots.  The lead didn't bother me as much as I thought
we were losing a little confidence at that time.  I knew we would make
a comeback.  I just hoped it was enough."

With the Cats 19 down, Chris Harrison entered the lineup and
immediately got into the offense by drilling an eight-foot jumper.

Rhodes followed with a baseline jump shot and the Cats had whittled the
lead to 15.  Arkansas never again matched its 19-point lead, but the
Hogs had a comfortable margin most of the first half.

With less than five minutes remaining, Arkansas held a 12-point
advantage, leading 42-30.  Walker made a marvelous move, taking Thurman
on the drive along the baseline to go in for a dunk.  Prickett added
two free throws and the Cats had cut the lead to eight, 42-34, the
closest they had been in an eternity.

Thurman pushed it back out to an 11-point lead, but once again it was
Walker to the rescue as he drove in for a basket.  Pope followed with a
three and the score was 45-39, Arkansas still led.

The Hogs rallied again, scoring the next five points, and with just
over a minute to play in the first half, Arkansas was up, 50-39.

There was no quit in the Cats this day.  Prickett got under for a layup
and with just two seconds to go, Epps hit a jump shot from eight feet
out and was fouled.  He made the free throw and the two teams went to
the dressing room with Arkansas leading 50-44.  Kentucky had cut that
19-point deficit down to six points at the half.

"We were back in the game where we wanted to be," Pitino said, "but we
still had to concentrate on the same things for the second half.  We
had to stop Thurman from the outside and Corliss Williamson inside and
we still had to get more easy baskets off our defense."

Kentucky made several moves toward the Hogs, cutting the lead to three
at one point, but each time Arkansas was able to rally.

193

194

After Williamson's basket with 7:14 to play, Arkansas led by nine,
74-65.  Kentucky was about to make its big charge.

Tony Delk drove inside and the big Arkansas frontline switched off to
pick him up.  He continued past the basket and made a reverse layup.

Corey Beck fouled Walker and the freshman, having the game of his brief
career, calmly dropped in both shots.  McCarty smashed home a
rim-rattling dunk and the Arkansas lead was down to three, 74-71.

There was still 4:11 left in the game.

After Thurman's basket pushed the Razorbacks back out by five, Walker
again took his turn at the free throw line and made them both.  Beck
did the same for the Hogs, and Arkansas had a 78-73 edge with 3:13
left.

With 2:29 to play, it was time for Walker to come through again.

He glided down the lane and missed a shot.  Have no fear, Walker was
right there to grab the rebound and stick it back in, Arkansas 78,
Kentucky 75.

The Cats finally caught up at 78-78 when McCarty drove in for a layup
and was fouled.  The junior converted to gain a three-point play the
old fashioned way.  Arkansas relinquished the lead only briefly.

Williamson drove for a basket to boost the Razorbacks back on top
80-78.

With 22 seconds to go, Mark Pope got his turn at the free throw stripe
for two shots.  He made them both and once again it was all even,
80-80.

Arkansas brought the ball downcourt for the last shot.  To no one's
surprise, the Hogs worked it inside to Williamson.  The Kentucky
defense swarmed all over him and Corliss took the only option open to
him.

He passed the ball back outside.  Enter Walker.  He picked off the pass
and Kentucky had possession of the ball with 5.5 seconds to play.

Score tied.  A timeout was called.  Pitino signaled for Rod Rhodes to
go into the game.

"I went to Rod," Pitino said, "because he was the best interior passer
we had.  I wanted him to create a drive to the basket so that he could
find somebody open or create a foul.  He was a very good 195 free throw
shooter.  I didn't actually call the play until I saw the Arkansas
defense.  We have a play that we call a box set' and you don't know
who's getting the basketball until you read the defense.  After looking
at Arkansas' defensive set we knew that Rod could get the ball
inbounds.  We called out Ice' and Rod drove into the lane and drew the
foul."

There were 1.3 seconds to go.  The score was tied 80-80.  Rhodes had
two shots.  If he made one, the victory belonged to Kentucky.

Anthony Epps had been watching from the bench as his teammates battled
back.  Each time a Wildcat went to the charity line, Epps would cross
all his fingers on both hands.  It is debatable how much influence that
had on the outcome, but the Kentucky players had been perfect at the
line down the stretch.  As Rhodes put his toe to the stripe, Epps could
not bear to look.  He turned his backside to the court and buried his
head in his hands.  Presumably, he still had his fingers crossed.

Rhodes was handed the basketball by the official.  He put up the first
of two shots.  It was close but fell off the left side.  No good.

Rod, an excellent free throw shooter who was connecting on 77 percent
of his free throws, surely would hit the second and hand the Wildcats
the victory.  This was to be the cruelest moment in Rhodes' checkered
career at UK The second shot was short, falling off the front of the
rim.  Overtime.

"I thought Rod would make one of the two," Pitino remembered, "but he
didn't.  But he got us in position to win the game and that's what we
wanted him to do.  The only bad thing about it was that it swung the
momentum to Arkansas."

Pitino was trying to get his players together, but they were
devastated.  "At that point Rod was sobbing uncontrollably.  We spent
the whole time trying to get him out of it.  I realized I couldn't put
him back in the game.  He just couldn't stop crying."

Rick had been right.  Arkansas clearly had the momentum as the overtime
session got underway.  The Hogs scored the first seven points and 11 of
the first 13 in the extra five-minute session.

196

With only 1:39 to play, the Razorbacks held a nine-point advantage,
91-82, and UK apparently was out of the game.  "It wasn't like being
down 31 to LSU with 15 minutes to go because here we not only had a big
margin to overcome, but we didn't have any time left on the clock.

At that point it looked bleak."  It did indeed, but this Cat of nine
lives had one more to use up.

Walker got loose on a fast break and made the layup.  Williamson fouled
him and departed with his fifth foul and 22 points.  Walker converted
at the free throw line to cut Kentucky's deficit to 91-85.  There was
1:33 to go.  Arkansas mishandled the inbounds pass under heavy UK
pressure and Pope came up with a tip-in and the scoreboard read:
Arkansas 91, Kentucky 87.

Clint McDaniel cashed in a pair of free throws to push the Razorbacks
back out by six, 93-87.

Delk, who had drawn a blank in six shots from three-point range, came
through when it counted.  Tony connected from 21

The celebration was on after the Cats heart-stopping comeback, which
saw them erase a ninepoint Arkansas advantage with 1.39 left in the
overtione period to take a 9S93 win.

197 feet for a three and cut the Arkansas lead to three, 9S90.  Only 41
ticks were left on the clock.

With 25 seconds left, it was Walker's turn again.  He posted up down
low and moved under for a basket.  It capped his career-high 23-point
game that was to help earn him the tournament's Most Valuable Player
award.

Pitino called it the best performance by a freshman, in a big game, he
had ever seen.  Still, the Cats were down by one, 93-92.

It was up to Anthony Epps to turn in what Pitino thought was the
biggest play of the game.  Scotty Thurman took the inbounds pass for
Arkansas and was hit immediately by a Kentucky trap.  Thurman tried to
get the pass away to Beck but Epps anticipated the play to perfection,
knifed into the passing lane, and made the interception.  Anthony raced
in with a shot that was wide of the mark but he took his own rebound
and was fouled as he attempted to put it back in.  Epps was a perfect
two-for-two from the line.  Kentucky, which had not led since Andre
Riddick's two free throws nine seconds into the game, was finally in
front 94-93.  The Georgia Dome clock showed there was still 19.3
seconds to play, an eternity in a game like this.  Everybody in the big
arena knew that Arkansas' Mr. Clutch, Scotty Thurman, would take the
last shot.

"We were not going to get beat by Thurman again as we did at Arkansas,"
Pitino said.  He decided that Walker would guard Thurman and he warned
his freshman star that Thurman would drive into him then push back to
get his shot.  Walker was taller than Thurman and just as quick.  It
proved a masterful move.  Thurman raced down court and well behind the
three-point arc, he went up for his shot.  Walker, with his gigantic
wingspan, had a hand right in his face.  The shot fell hopelessly off
the rim.  Kentucky grabbed the rebound and Delk was fouled.  He made
one of two free throws to complete the scoring.  Kentucky had won one
of the most dramatic victories in its history.  The scoreboard blinked
the tale.

Kentucky 95, Arkansas 93.

There was a wild celebration in the Georgia Dome but nobody 198

: l celebrated more that the Wildcats themselves.  Pitino rushed onto
the floor and embraced Epps in a big bear hug.  The players were giving
each other high fives and hugs.  Everybody was consoling Walter McCarty
helps clip down the nets to commemorate Kentucky's fourth straight SEC
Tournament championship.

199 the heart-broken Rhodes and urging him to take part in cutting down
the nets.  Delk picked up the plastic barrel of ice water and dumped it
over Pitino's head.

It was the fourth straight year that Rick had led the Wildcats to the
SEC Tournament title.  In all, the Cats had won the trophy 19 times.

But noneþrepeat noneþhad equaled this one for thrills, for excitement,
and for sheer determination by a gutsy bunch of players to bring the
trophy home.

The championship ritual of dumping a cooler on the coach's head moved
indoors, courtesy of Tony Delk.

the end.

200