Sure Was Fun While It Lasted

My eyes are tired. My neck hurts. I can’t look any more. I can’t watch these guys run back and forth, back and forth, back and forth any more. Is it over? Is the Loyola Marymount game finished yet? How many points does North Carolina have now--150? 175? 200?

What’s that? You say they wound up with 123? You mean to sit there and tell me Loyola’s opponents just went out there and got 123 points in a national college basketball tournament game?

Wow.

In that case, I only have one more question:

Who won?

There are some things in this life that we cannot be sure of, and this is one of them. You tell me Loyola Marymount gave up 123 points. I still have to ask you who won.

It’s like that baseball fan back in New York, 25 years ago, when the Mets were so rotten. One day, the Mets went crazy and beat the Cubs, 19-1. Some guy called up a New York newspaper office that day and asked how the Mets made out.

“They scored 19 runs!” he was told.

“Wow,” the guy replied. “Did they win?”

That’s what I need to know. North Carolina’s Tar Heels lit up Loyola’s Lions for 123 points, huh?

Did they win?

Oh. They did, huh? The final score was what--123-97? Well, it figures that some team had to score more than three points a minute to beat Loyola. Loyola sometimes scores three points in a second . Loyola has guys who can hit from four -point range. From five-point range. From vendor range. From the lobby. From the car.

What a shame the season has to be over. How wonderful it would have been Saturday to see the Tar Heels with their feet stuck in the goo, with their pulses beating like bongo drums, with their tongues dragging on the floor. How sweet it would have been to see even Coach Dean Smith out of breath, from something other than those cigarettes he smokes.

We knew Paul Westhead’s Lions had a good chance to win, because they were still within 30 points at halftime.

No lead is safe against these guys, normally. The Lions let you get ahead by 15 or 20 points, then have you right where they want you. They run you into the floor. They play like a team that’s late for a bus. They look like citizens of Tokyo who just spotted Godzilla in town. Dr. Richard Kimble didn’t run this hard. Loyola’s idea of a patient offense is when the referee lets one of them shoot a free throw.

And now, they’re gone. Gone for good. They will not be forgotten, though, because this was one fun team to watch. This was a team that practically revolutionized college basketball. It was sort of an anti-team. Teamwork amounted to: “You got it, shoot it.” And it worked. There were no jealousies, no animosities, no apologies. The Wizards of Westhead were in this thing together. They did it their way.

Unfortunately for anyone who wanted or expected them to win the national championship, Loyola’s way did not work against North Carolina. The Tar Heels were too smart to fall into the Lions’ trap, and too good to be left unguarded to score at will, the way J.R. Reid and Ranzino Smith were. I mean, come on. Loyola’s offense may have looked like five guys running for a bus, but Loyola’s defense looked like five guys waiting for one.

There were times Saturday, Westhead was closer to J.R. Reid than the guy guarding him was. I haven’t seen anybody so alone since Robinson Crusoe. I mean, Alfred Dreyfus had more people around him in prison than J.R. Reid did in Salt Lake. Reid probably kept checking his mouthwash and sniffing his armpits, wondering why nobody came near him.

Well, the last game was Loyola basketball in a nutshell. Maybe even in a nut house. Think about what happened: Loyola shot the ball wildly and poorly. Loyola played little or no defense. Loyola played an ugly, unscientific, unimaginative, unquestionably bad basketball game . . .

And still scored 97 points against one of the best teams in the country. That’s why Loyola’s student body should be busting with pride today. Planning a parade. Shredding confetti. Painting Westchester red. In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the Lions sleep tonight, but they sure did make a lot of noise before they went to sleep, didn’t they?

Before they were finished, these guys had coaches from all across the country thinking about imitating their style--which was no style at all. Loyola Marymount was to basketball what punk rock was to music. It was free-form, manic, original, and hard to take for purists. It was pagan basketball. No rules, no restrictions, anything goes.

Loyola took the college game into triple figures. Loyola got 97 on a bad day. Time was, two teams combined wouldn’t get 97. Loyola averaged 110.4 points a game. When Indiana beat North Carolina for the 1981 NCAA championship, the teams combined for 113.

Bud Grant and George Mikan once played on a National Basketball Assn. team--the Lakers, in fact--that scored 18 points in an entire game. That was 1950, when the Lakers still made their home in Minneapolis. They got beat by Fort Wayne one day, 19-18.

Loyola had 18 points Saturday by about the opening tipoff. Sadly, Carolina already had 31. The Tar Heels had 65 by halftime, and 100 with eight minutes left to play. Dean Smith actually congratulated Loyola afterward for playing good defense, which was like congratulating Vanna White for being a good speller.

Oh, well. Sorry to see you go, Loyola.

You were fun while you lasted.