Best Championship Ever Played?

There are sometimes events that call for us to deviate from the usual topic and team. Monday's NCAA Men's Championship certainly more than merits the attention.

The tourney, Final Four, and the incredible championship game once again prove the genius behind a single elimination tournament.

For any hoops fan who may have missed the game, get to a replay quickly. This game was the ultimate example of competitive basketball, and the question is already out there…

Was this the greatest basketball championship game ever played?

I don't follow college ball until tournament time after a couple of rounds have been played, so others can talk about this games all time rank in a historical context.

But damn it certainly was one of the best ever, the last five seconds were as close to unbelievable as it can get, and the heartbreak for UNC immediately made me think of the longtime Wide World of Sports intro - "The thrill of victory, the agony of defeat."

The college game has an emotional content the pros can't match.

Tough call for me. I've seen so many fantastic tourney finals over the years that have left me on cloud nine, that its difficult to single out just one game. As a BIG EAST fan right from the beginning I have had a special interest in finals involving BIG EAST TEAMS. I'll put this Villanova win right up there with the Villanova win over Georgetown in the 80's and Georgetown's win over Houston also in the 80's. There have been other great finals but for now I'll go with those as my personal 3 best.

swish

swish wrote:Tough call for me. I've seen so many fantastic tourney finals over the years that have left me on cloud nine, that its difficult to  single out just one game. As a BIG EAST fan right from the beginning I have had a special interest in finals involving BIG EAST TEAMS. I'll put this Villanova win right up there with the Villanova win over Georgetown in the 80's and Georgetown's win over Houston also in the 80's. There have been other great finals but for now I'll go with those as my personal 3 best.

 swish                                                                                                                                        

North Carolina State over Houston and Jimmy V looking for someone to hug is my top one. Nobody gave them much of a chance.

beat

I don't watch college sports but I was in a bar having a glass of wine with a friend last night and watched the last couple of minutes. What a wild finish. Two exceedingly tough 3pt shots. The UNC one was off-the-charts for difficulty for a college player.

Congrats to both teams.

Neither team had a 7'er. All that low post game you saw was being done by players around 6'9" 225-240#. In other words, NBA PFs and maybe even SFs.

And I agree with beat, as good as this one was, and it was really good, I think Jimmy V's still tops my charts...


bob


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Jimmy V for me too.

Jimmy V and NC State certainly were a great Cinderella story. Lorenzo Charles' buzzer-beating dunk off a missed shot and Jimmy V's mad dash looking for a hug are probably among the top buzzer beaters and feel good moments in tourney history.  

I'll give that one the best ending too, but I thought last night had the edge in terms of the game, start to finish.

Being a member of Coaches vs Cancer myself, and about to pass a year since my own cancer surgery, Valvano will always be an inspiration to me.  Therefore, anyone who wants to give the '82 - '83 Wolfpack victory over Houston, and the NC State coach top honors, gets no real argument here.

NYCelt wrote:Jimmy V and NC State certainly were a great Cinderella story. Lorenzo Charles' buzzer-beating dunk off a missed shot and Jimmy V's mad dash looking for a hug are probably among the top buzzer beaters and feel good moments in tourney history.  

I'll give that one the best ending too, but I thought last night had the edge in terms of the game, start to finish.

Being a member of Coaches vs Cancer myself, and about to pass a year since my own cancer surgery, Valvano will always be an inspiration to me.  Therefore, anyone who wants to give the '82 - '83 Wolfpack victory over Houston, and the NC State coach top honors, gets no argument here.

Biggest difference I see is NCS was such an underdog and Houston had a couple players on that team that went on to have pretty good pro careers. Not sure if any player in last nights game will be able to say that.

http://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/boxscores/1983-04-04-houston.html

beat

Being an NC State fan and an ABC fan (Anybody But Carolina) The 1983 Championship has stood the test of time as the craziest, best Final of all time. Clearly, they were underdogs. State used junk defenses and fouling crappy free throw shooters (where has I heard and seen this strategy before!!) to put themselves in that enviable position ALL teams try to put themselves in each time they lace up the sneakers. And with less than a second left they pulled off the improbable ending all of us know so well.

The difference was Houston had their chance to take the lead on the next to last play I believe if memory serves me correctly. I believe they were shooting foul shots and failed. Regardless, State had the last possession with a tie as the current score. The rest is history.

I have to give the greatest ending of all time now to this game because it was two-fold. Carolina tied with an improbable three with 4.7 seconds left and Villanova came right back and had the ball aloft as the clock expired. This ending will never be topped in my humble but accurate opinion.

Some may say (OK, me!) the 1974 Semifinals with UCLA vs. NC State was the greatest game or at least in the Top 3. The NC State vs. Marquette Final was a mere footnote. It was the beginning of the end of the UCLA dominance as the following season they won the Championship again but went on a significant hiatus after that.

db



Great memories for me growing up.

dbrown4 wrote:Being an NC State fan and an ABC fan (Anybody But Carolina) The 1983 Championship has stood the test of time as the craziest, best Final of all time.  Clearly, they were underdogs.  State used junk defenses and fouling crappy free throw shooters (where has I heard and seen this strategy before!!) to put themselves in that enviable position ALL teams try to put themselves in each time they lace up the sneakers.  And with less than a second left they pulled off the improbable ending all of us know so well.  

The difference was Houston had their chance to take the lead on the next to last play I believe if memory serves me correctly.  I believe they were shooting foul shots and failed.  Regardless, State had the last possession with a tie as the current score.  The rest is history.  

I have to give the greatest ending of all time now to this game because it was two-fold.  Carolina tied with an improbable three with 4.7 seconds left and Villanova came right back and had the ball aloft as the clock expired.  This ending will never be topped in my humble but accurate opinion.

Some may say (OK, me!) the 1974 Semifinals with UCLA vs. NC State was the greatest game or at least in the Top 3.  The NC State vs. Marquette Final was a mere footnote.  It was the beginning of the end of the UCLA dominance as the following season they won the Championship again but went on a significant hiatus after that.

db

Great memories for me growing up.      

Here is the summary of that game to help refresh your memory..............which is pretty accurate anyway.............


National championship game[edit]
In the final game, played in Albuquerque, New Mexico, NC State led at halftime by a score of 33-25. Houston was hampered by foul trouble that plagued star Clyde Drexler, who picked up four first half fouls. The last of these was a questionable offensive foul; the officials ruled that Drexler had run into sophomore guard Terry Gannon, but television replays seemed to show that Gannon had initiated the contact and that he grabbed Drexler's legs as he fell to the court. In the second half, the Cougars came out with a second wind and established control of the game, eventually taking a seven point lead.

However, things were not all good for Houston. Since the game was played in Albuquerque, players had to deal with the city's mile-high altitude as well as their own physical capabilities. The Cougars' star center, Akeem Olajuwon, had problems doing this and tired quickly, needing to check out of the game multiple times so he could put on an oxygen mask and recover. With Olajuwon on the bench, Houston head coach Guy Lewis decided that in order to protect the lead and the health of his big man at the same time, the Cougars needed to start slowing the game down.

Once again, this enabled the Wolfpack to return to their standby strategy of extending the game. Houston's free throw shooting was very suspect entering the game, which worked greatly in NC State's favor as they were able to rally back and even the score at 52 in the final two minutes. On what would be the last Houston possession, Valvano called for his players to back off and let freshman guard Alvin Franklin bring the ball up the court. The Wolfpack defenders would let the Cougars employ their slowdown strategy of passing it around. Once the ball got back to Franklin, whenever that happened, he was to be fouled immediately. With 1:05 left, the freshman was fouled and sent to the line for a one-and-one. The idea to foul Franklin sprung from the enormity of the moment; NC State believed that the relatively inexperienced Franklin could not withstand the pressure of going to the line with the championship at stake and knowing that fifty million viewers were tuned in to watch the game. The theory proved correct as Franklin failed to convert and the Wolfpack grabbed the rebound. Valvano called timeout with 44 seconds left and drew up a play for senior guard Dereck Whittenburg during the timeout, which called for the team to pass him the ball with ten seconds left on the clock so he could take the final shot.

Houston needed a defensive stop so they could get another chance to close out the game. Lewis decided to move from the man-to-man defense his team had been running the whole game to a half court zone trap defense. The Wolfpack, who were not expecting the defensive adjustment, were forced to deviate and began passing the ball around just to keep the Cougars from stealing it. Houston nearly got the turnover it was looking for when Whittenburg made an errant pass to Gannon that Drexler nearly came away with before the sophomore regained control of the ball. The ball eventually wound up in the hands of guard Sidney Lowe, who gave it to forward and fellow senior Thurl Bailey in the corner.

Trying to keep the ball moving, as he had been double teamed as soon as he received the pass, Bailey looked back toward Whittenburg, who was approximately thirty feet away from the hoop near midcourt. Bailey threw what Whittenburg would later call a "poor fundamental" overhanded pass which Houston's Benny Anders, guarding Whittenburg on the play, was in position to steal. At this point, Whittenburg harkened back to his high school days with Morgan Wootten at DeMatha Catholic High School, where he was taught to catch the basketball with both hands every time he possessed it. By doing this, he was able to defend against Anders trying to steal the ball, as he only went for it with one hand. If Whittenburg had not done that, Anders would have had an uncontested breakaway toward the other end and would likely have gotten the winning score; at the time, college basketball games were played with a running clock from beginning to end (this is no longer the case) and the Wolfpack would likely not have had enough time to even inbound the ball. As it was, though, Anders merely knocked the ball out of Whittenburg's hands momentarily and the senior guard easily regained control.

The clock, meanwhile, had ticked down to five seconds and Whittenburg was still standing a significant distance from the goal, Once he regained control, Whittenburg turned and launched a desperation shot to try and win the game for NC State. The shot's trajectory took it to the front of the basket where Olajuwon was covering Wolfpack center Lorenzo Charles. As he watched the shot, Olajuwon said he knew the shot was going to come up short but he also did not want to go for the ball too early because of the potential for goaltending. Charles took advantage of the indecision by Olajuwon and went up for the air ball, then in one motion scored the go-ahead points with a two-handed tip-in dunk. The final two seconds ticked off the clock before Houston could inbound the ball, and with that the game ended and the Wolfpack were the national champions.

beat wrote:

NYCelt wrote:Jimmy V and NC State certainly were a great Cinderella story. Lorenzo Charles' buzzer-beating dunk off a missed shot and Jimmy V's mad dash looking for a hug are probably among the top buzzer beaters and feel good moments in tourney history.  

I'll give that one the best ending too, but I thought last night had the edge in terms of the game, start to finish.

Being a member of Coaches vs Cancer myself, and about to pass a year since my own cancer surgery, Valvano will always be an inspiration to me.  Therefore, anyone who wants to give the '82 - '83 Wolfpack victory over Houston, and the NC State coach top honors, gets no argument here.

Biggest difference I see is NCS was such an underdog and Houston had a couple players on that team that went on to have pretty good pro careers. Not sure if any player in last nights game will be able to say that.

http://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/boxscores/1983-04-04-houston.html

beat

Beat,

I think Marcus Paige from UNC has a good shot at an NBA career. After him, maybe no one from either team will get to the NBA. That adds to the appeal of the matchup between 'Nova and UNC; lots of upper-classmen, and pure, unspoiled basketball. Two great teams, to be sure!

Regards