Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 25, 1990 TAG: 9003242271
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Brill
DATELINE: EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. LENGTH: Medium
If you want to get picky, maybe "The Shot 3" for those who recall Michael Jordan's jumper that won the NCAA Tournament for North Carolina, or Keith Smart's leaper from virtually the same spot as Jordan's that made Indiana a champion in '87.
But neither of those can approach the drama, or controversy, that surrounded the goal that Tate George made for Connecticut on Thursday to rescue the Huskies against Clemson, 71-70, in the NCAA East semifinals.
Without an NBA clock, which shows tenths of seconds, there is no way Connecticut could win.
Even Hank Nichols, supervisor of NCAA officials, agrees.
"With an old-style clock, which would have showed one second left when the guy [Clemson's Sean Tyson] is shooting a free throw, the game probably ends when he misses," Nichols said.
Nobody would have envisioned a possibility to win.
In a college gym, or any arena where the NBA doesn't play, the clock would have read 0:01 when Tyson went to the line with Clemson ahead 70-69.
In that case, perhaps Tyson would have tried to miss intentionally. Almost certainly, Connecticut would have been instructed to heave the ball after the rebound, figuring there wouldn't be time left to get a timeout.
But when Tyson shot, the clock read 0:01.6. So the Huskies got the timeout with a full second left.
"That gave us a psychological advantage," said Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun on Friday. "I knew we had a full tick left in this case. That was important, really important."
The human factor.
"The clock operator doesn't start the clock until the ball hits the player's hands," Nichols said. "That takes a fraction of a second."
Which is all George needed. He caught the ball in the air, came down, turned around and got off a smooth shot.
Impossible in one second? Of course. But factor in the human element, the pause until the clock operator sees the ball hit in George's hand. He can't push the button too early. Otherwise, the horn goes off before the ball is touched and the operator looks stupid.
"You can't eliminate the human element," Nichols said.
Under the stands in the Duke locker room, coach Mike Krzyzewski came in after watching the overhead television and told his anxious team, "Clemson won."
Coach K, who had been waiting for the first game to end, had been advising his team on its progess and startled his players with that announcement, because in his other trips to the dressing quarters, he had said Connecticut was ahead.
But when Connecticut missed and Tyson was fouled with less than two seconds to play, Krzyzewski was certain that Clemson had pulled off the upset.
"I was standing there by myself," said center Alaa Abdelnaby. "I thought, `OK, Clemson has won, and now we've got to win so we can get another shot at them.'
"Then I heard this rumbling in the stands. Honestly, I thought somebody had fallen from the upper deck. I stuck my head out in the hall, thinking I'd see rescue people rushing out with stretchers, and here comes Coach K.
"He said, `I can't believe they let them get that last shot.' "
Said Krzyzewski, "I felt two extremes of emotion. I felt for both teams. It was a tremendous way to win, and the worst way to lose.
"Absolutely the worst."
Scott Burrell is a superb athlete. A 19-year-old freshman from Hamden, Conn., he was a first-round draft pick of the Seattle Mariners last June. He's a 6-foot-5 pitcher with a 90 mph fast ball who also once hit seven home runs in four games.
He would have signed a baseball contract, but the Mariners, notoriously tight with the big bucks, "didn't offer me enough money," he said. "They just thought I'd sign for anything."
Seattle's loss was Connecticut's gain.
Oh, yes, Burrell also was a star quarterback in high school.
He threw the pass that George caught to make "The Shot."
Clemson defensed it wrong. The Tigers had 6-foot-10 Elden Campbell playing in front of Burrell, "but he covered me to the left. I could see the opening all the way."
Burrell, who had to remain stationary because the Connecticut timeout didn't come after a score, agreed if Campbell had cheated hard to Scott's right hand, "I don't think I could have made that pass. It certainly would have been much harder."
Calhoun, using the football-baseball analogy to the extreme, called it "a fly pattern, a home-run play."
Clemson called it a killer.
Certainly, it was something for the history books.
In this case, time literally stood still. B5 B1 BRILL Brill
by CNB