SMU Hoops & the Big Dance

[RGV Pony]

...well maybe not this year, but since it's that time of year, I'd like to hear what everyone's take is (was) on what should've been SMU bball's finest hour.

Way back when, that season when our beloved Ponies ranked as high as #2, then imploded, losing to Chaminade & then the shameful collapse vs. the mighty Ramblers of Loyola. What happened? What was the team's downfall?

On the topic of most of the guys on that team, now & then this season I've seen discussion on the greatest SMU bball games ever...but nary a mention of the 37-36 loss to #1 GTown the year before the aforementioned season. Anyone see that game, or go to it? Did SMU go up 4-2 then run the four corners?

[OldPony]

Pre shot clock. G'town slowed it don.

[jtstang]

On the topic of most of the guys on that team, now & then this season I've seen discussion on the greatest SMU bball games ever...but nary a mention of the 37-36 loss to #1 GTown the year before the aforementioned season. Anyone see that game, or go to it? Did SMU go up 4-2 then run the four corners?

Oh I saw that game, and SMU shoulda won, leading most of the game. Nice blockout of Ewing on that free throw, Larry Davis.

[Treadway21]

On the 84 Georgetown loss, didn't Johnny Fuller end up taking the last shot, rather than one of our go to guys such as Carl Wright? I believe Johnny Fuller was a freshman at the time. I couldn't understand at the time why Bliss would have a freshman take such a pressure shot. Of course, Larry Davis getting beat for the rebound on the free throw was heartbreaking.

[jtstang]

I can't remember who took the last shot. Carl Wright was a great scorer, but not so great a shooter, if you get my drift. It shouldn't have mattered anyway. Davis was a great inside presence and good rebounder, and he'll always be remembered for the one he didn't get...and I guess those stolen checks he tried to cash.

But I digress...that game broke my heart because we were peaking and good enough to make some real noise that year.

[Treadway21]

Agreed - since Georgetown won it all that year. It makes the collapse the next year that much more disappointing, since we had most everyone back, as best I remember. Which brings us back to what happened to our great team of 85. I think losing to Tech when we would have been ranked #1 was the beginning of the end. But I can't remember anything specific as to why we went out in the first round of the NCAA tournament that year. I had forgotten about Larry Davis' check issue. Did we lose him in 85 or 86?

[RGV Pony]

why wasn't Koncak on Ewing?

[jtstang]

why wasn't Koncak on Ewing?

You're taxing my memory, but didn't the Hoyas have another bohemoth rebounder that year? Maybe 'cak was on him.

[EastStang]

They did a big bald guy whose name escapes me at the moment. As to the following year, right after we beat UNC, there was some internal strife or something where Carl Wright ended up getting suspended.

[jtstang]

They did a big bald guy whose name escapes me at the moment. As to the following year, right after we beat UNC, there was some internal strife or something where Carl Wright ended up getting suspended.

Yeah, he smacked Scotty Johnson on the bus is what I heard.

[Stallion]

I think the initial post maybe mixing amd matching years. In the year SMU was ranked Number 2 in the Country (with No. 1 having been beaten) SMU's first loss of the season was to Texas Tech in Lubbock. SMU fell behind by about 11 with only 1:30 or so to play but somehow closed the gap and lost at the buzzer. I was personally at that game. Believe me you remember these things when you are just about the only SMU fan in a crowd of 12,000 Texas Tech fans. Chaimanade was a different season because it was a Christmas Hawaii Tournament and SWC play never started until January.

[EastStang]

I went to the game in Greensboro against UNC. (I had to bribe a University of Maryland assistant AD with a bottle of scotch). I figured after that game there was no way we could not win the National championship. Then we limped home in conference play at 8-8. That was another example of a team that just lost its will to win. In hindsight given what revelations have come out about Bliss' tenure at SMU, there may have been tensions on that team due to differentials in incentives being paid to players.

[jtstang]

I think the initial post maybe mixing amd matching years. In the year SMU was ranked Number 2 in the Country (with No. 1 having been beaten) SMU's first loss of the season was to Texas Tech in Lubbock. SMU fell behind by about 11 with only 1:30 or so to play but somehow closed the gap and lost at the buzzer. I was personally at that game. Believe me you remember these things when you are just about the only SMU fan in a crowd of 12,000 Texas Tech fans. Chaimanade was a different season because it was a Christmas Hawaii Tournament and SWC play never started until January.

That wasn't too bad...back then, Chaminade made a living out of beating the big boys in their tourney.

[The XtC]

Just to provide a bit of framework here, SMU finished the 1983-84 season with a loss to Georgetown in what was actually the 3rd round of the NCAA tournament. Then opened the 1984-85 season at 17-0, and ranked as high as 2nd in the country, before losing to Chaminade, Dec. 20th, 1984.

In 1984, the NCAA tournament invited 48 teams. The bottom 12 seeded teams had to play in what was then called the "Preliminary" round. The top 12 seeds had byes until the "Second" round. SMU did not have to play in the Prelim round, defeated Miami (Ohio) in the "First" round, then lost to Georgetown in the "Second" round. It was Georgetowns first game of the tournament.

Carl Wright did take the last shot for SMU. Ewings tip in gave Georgetown a 3 point lead with only seconds to play. SMU pushed the ball upcourt with no resistance from the defense that only wanted to avoid fouling to stop the clock. Wright dunked the ball at the buzzer, to make the final score 37-36. There was no 3-point shot in those days.

The bald guy you are remembering was probably Michael Graham. Graham was just a freshman that year, but he was a terror on the boards. He flunked out after 1 year at Georgetown, and dissapeared from basketball. Two other young forwards on that team, David Wingate and Reggie Williams, became the stars at Georgetown after Ewing graduated, and went on to play in the NBA.

The Chaminade game was played after midnight, Dallas time. I remember hearing about it the next day, as the football team was boarding the plane to fly to Hawaii for the Aloha Bowl. The year before, Chaminade had beaten #1 ranked Virginia (Ralph Sampson) in the same tournament. No one had ever heard of them before that.

Larry Davis was arrested for passing bad checks in May of 1985.

To answer the original question, SMU cratered in 1985 because tweo of their key players were dopeheads/thugs/criminals, etc. There was a strong rumor amongst the people who knew Wright that he was intentionally shaving points in the 2nd game against Tech (in Dallas, when he dribbled off his foot at the end of the game,) because he owed money to a drug dealer. I can say from personal observations that Carl spent most of that spring very, very stoned. There was alot of inner conflict on that team, between Koncak, Moore, and Lewis on one side, and Wright and Davis on the other. Thats why they fell apart.

[Stallion]

Explain to me how a team could play 17 games before December 20-again I don't have the facts in front of me but I'm pretty sure that is incorrect. Remember in the SWC that year they would have also played 16 conference games. So 17+1+16+ games between 12/20 to Jan SWC opener=TOO MANY GAMES. The bald guy is probably a reference to SMU's ________ Williams the 6-9 big kid.