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1997 Final Four

The Road To The 1997 Final Four

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Arizona came to Indianapolis seeking its first national championship. Kentucky was looking to repeat. It was Dean Smith’s swan song at North Carolina and Minnesota’s high point. Here’s a look back on the road all four teams took to the 1997 Final Four.

GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS
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ARIZONA

Lute Olson’s team played below their potential most of the season. The Wildcats were loaded, with future NBA players Mike Bibby and Jason Terry—and neither of them were even the two leading scorers. Michael Dickerson and Miles Simon each averaged 18ppg. But Arizona lost seven games in the Pac-10, nine overall and then were less than impressive in surviving South Alabama & College of Charleston to open the NCAA Tournament.

The regionals in Birmingham was where everything changed. Kansas was the top-heavy favorite to win the national championship and led by Paul Pierce. Arizona overcame 27 points from Pierce by forcing twenty turnovers and getting a combined 58 from Bibby, Dickerson and Simon. The 85-82 upset rattled the entire bracket. The Wildcats then survived 10-seed Providence. In spite of blowing an 85-78 lead in the final 1:15 of regulation and going to overtime, Arizona ultimately got it done. Simon dropped 30 in the 96-92 win that earned Olson his third Final Four appearance.

KENTUCKY

The defending NCAA champs were led by Ron Mercer and Derek Anderson who each averaged 18ppg. Anthony Epps and Wayne Turner ran the show. This season wasn’t like the 1996 coronation ride. Kentucky never rose higher than #3 nationally and finished behind South Carolina in the SEC regular season. But these Wildcats turned it on in March and it started with blowing through the conference tournament and getting the 1-seed in the West.

Kentucky continued to roll through the first four rounds. They were challenged only by Iowa in the Round of 32, but survived thanks to a strong defensive effort—holding the Hawkeyes to 40 percent shooting and forcing 18 turnovers in a 75-68 win. In the regional final, Kentucky coasted past a Utah team that had future pro players in Keith Van Horn and Andre Miller. The 72-69 win gave Rick Pitino his third Final Four in Lexington and fourth overall as a head coach.

NORTH CAROLINA

Dean Smith had another well-stocked roster. Antwan Jamison averaged 19 points/9 rebounds and Vince Carter was good for 13/5. Shammond Williams kicked in 14 more and ran the offense. North Carolina finished second in the ACC, but beat Tim Duncan’s Wake Forest en route to a conference tournament title that got them the #1 seed in the East.

The Tar Heels did not play well early in the tournament. None of their first three wins, over Fairfield, Colorado and Cal were impressive, but the win over Colorado came against a team with Chauncey Billups in its lineup and it made Smith the winningnest head coach in college basketball history. UNC put it all together against Louisville in the Elite Eight, with six players hitting double figures in a 97-74 rout. Dean was going to his 11th Final Four in what would prove to be his final season.

MINNESOTA

Clem Haskins was the most successful coach Minnesota ever had and already the only one to even take the program to a regional final, back in 1990. This was Clem’s best team. They were well-balanced, with Big Ten MVP Bobby Jackson leading the way at the point with 15 points/6 rebounds/4 assist per game. The Gophers blew away the field in their conference and coasted through two rounds of the NCAA Tournament.

Things got hairy at the regionals in San Antonio. Minnesota coughed up multiple leads in the Sweet 16 against Clemson, then fell behind by six in overtime. With Jackson pouring in 36 points, the Gophers ultimately survived 90-84 in double OT. Minnesota balance carried the day against 2-seed UCLA. Jackson’s 18 points was first-among-equals and after spotting the Bruins a five-point halftime lead, the Gophs took over and won 80-72. They were going to what remains the only Final Four in their history.

INDIANAPOLIS: THE 1991 FINAL FOUR

Arizona-North Carolina opened the proceedings and defense was the story, with both teams shooting below 35 percent from the floor. The stars for both teams—Bibby & Simon for Arizona, Carter & Jamison for Carolina, were productive, but Arizona’s duo was a little bit better, scoring a combined 44 points to 36 for the Tar Heel twosome. That matched the margin of victory in the 66-58 Wildcat win.

Minnesota-Kentucky could have been a New Year’s Day bowl game in the way it matched Big Ten power against SEC speed. The Gophers controlled play inside the arc and on the glass. The Wildcats forced turnovers and were much better from the three-point line. Kentucky won 78-69.

Early in the all-Wildcats championship game, CBS analyst Billy Packer said that the two teams could play for a long time with very little separation showing. He was prophetic. The game was tight all the way and went to overtime. The difference was Simon, who dropped 30 points. Arizona finally had a national championship and they remain the only team to defeat three #1 seeds along the way to a title.

1997 Sports: A Year Of Redemption

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The year in 1997 sports was one of long-sought redemption, be it an individual, a college program or a professional organization. Teams and players that had gone through frustrating searches for championships began breaking through.

GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS
Start reading today. 


*Arizona basketball coach Lute Olson had built the Wildcat program from the ground up, just as he’d done with Iowa before that. In spite of three previous trips to the Final Four, Lute had never cut down the nets. In 1997, he did, as his Arizona team made history in ousting three #1 seed en route to the crown.
*The Michigan Wolverines have a proud football tradition that goes back to the beginning of the 20th century, but it had been 1948 since they won an national championship. An undefeated season and Rose Bowl win made them co-national champs, along with Nebraska.
*The Detroit Red Wings had a cast of players that had made a recent habit of coming up short in the NHL playoffs, most notably in 1996, when they had a record-setting regular season, and then lost to the Colorado Avalanche. The Red Wings took their revenge in 1997, knocking out Colorado and then beating the Philadelphia Flyers to win the Stanley Cup.
*And perhaps no redemption was sweeter, more long-sought or more celebrated on the national stage, than that of Denver Broncos quarterback John Elway. At the age of 37, he’d never won a Super Bowl and his teams suffered blowouts in their three previous tries. In a year where everyone expected them to be blown out by the Green Bay Packers, the Broncos delivered.
*Jim Leyland had become a respected baseball manager with the Pittsburgh Pirates, but suffered some agonizing losses in the National League Championship Series in the early 1990s. In later years, Leyland would go on to the Detroit Tigers, win two American League pennants, but never the World Series. In between Detroit and Pittsburgh, Leyland managed the Florida Marlins, and in 1997, he got his ring, as they won a seven-game World Series with the Cleveland Indians.
There was more to the world of 1997 sports. Michael Jordan led the Chicago Bulls to another NBA championship. Two legends retired, as Nebraska football coach Tom Osborne and North Carolina basketball coach Dean Smith said goodbye–Osborne with a co-national title and Smith with a Final Four trip. In baseball, Larry Walker and Tony Gwynn each made late summer runs at hitting .400 before coming up short.
The ultimate story of 1997 sports though was redemption. The links below provide more detail on the stories above.
This One’s For John: The 1997 Denver Broncos Finally Climb The Mountaintop
The 1997 Arizona Wildcats Slay Three Giants
Magic In Motown: The 1997 Detroit Red Wings & 1997 Michigan Football
The 1997 World Series: Seven Games & Then Some
The 1997 NBA Finals: How Jordan Willed The Bulls Past The Utah Jazz

The 1997 Arizona Wildcats Slay Three Giants En Route To A National Title

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The Arizona Wildcats had been knocking on the door of a national championship for at least ten years, under the building of Lute Olson, one of the great architects in college basketball history when it came to building a program from the ground up.

GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS
Start reading today. 

The Wildcats made the Final Four in 1988 and 1994, but lost in the national semifinals both times. They suffered bitter disappointment in losing as a #1 seed in the 1989 Sweet 16, and then taking first-round upsets in 1992 and 1993.

For Olson, the almost-but-not-quite phenomena went all the way back to his days at Iowa, when he rebuilt the Hawkeye program, took them to the 1980 Final Four, but lost in the national semis.

Arizona didn’t have a great season in 1997. They went 19-9 overall, and their 11-7 record in the Pac-10 left them fifth in their own conference. The Wildcats had some excellent backcourt talent in Mike Bibby and Jason Terry, who would each enjoy distinguished NBA careers, along with Miles Simon, but they weren’t dominant and they were a #4 seed in the Southeast Regional of the 1997 NCAA Tournament.

Maybe not having the pressure of the high seed was exactly what Arizona needed. When they advanced to the Sweet 16 in Birmingham, the pressure was squarely on the shoulders of top-seeded Kansas. The Jayhawks were coached by Roy Williams, led by future NBA star Paul Pierce, and were the heavy favorite to win the national championship.

Pierce looked the part of the likely Hall of Famer he is, scoring 27 points and grabbing 14 rebounds, but Arizona countered with a complete team effort that shocked the nation. They got contributions from people like Michael Dickerson, who scored 20 points, and A.J. Bramlett, who pulled down 13 boards. Arizona pulled the 85-82 upset and the region’s #1 seed was gone. It was just the start of the Wildcats’ giant-killing spree.

One of the giants was not Providence, but it was the 10th-seeded Friars who stood in the way of Lute and another trip to the Final Four. Providence’s best player was God Shammgod, whose name had captured the national media’s imagination for obvious reasons, with the irony of him playing for a Jesuit college not lost on anyone.

He could also play some hoops and scored 23 in the regional final, a game that Providence appeared to have won at least twice. Simon was electric for Arizona, scoring 30 points and the Wildcats won an extraordinary basketball game, going to overtime to take it 96-92. Simon was named the region’s Outstanding Player.

The 1997 Final Four was in Indianapolis, and the top seed in the East awaited Arizona. In what would be the final game for North Carolina legend Dean Smith, the Wildcats ousted the Tar Heels 66-58 as Simon and Bibby combined for 44 points and outplayed UNC’s own future NBA player, Vince Carter.

No team in the history of the NCAA Tournament had ever beaten three # 1 seeds, and if Arizona was going to be the first, the biggest dog was still out there. Kansas might have been the favorite, North Carolina might have had Dean on the sidelines, but Kentucky was the defending national champion.

The NCAA final was a classic and one of just three championship games in the post-John Wooden era to go to overtime (1989 and 2008 being the others). Neither team shot well from the floor, but Arizona consistently got to the line, outscoring Kentucky 34-9 from the charity stripe, as UK launched thirty shots from three-point range.

Simon scored 30 points, Arizona won 84-79, and the incredible March journey was complete. After years of heartache as a high seed, the Wildcats had made history in beating three straight #1 seeds. And everyone in college basketball–including defeated Kentucky coach Rick Pitino in the postgame interview–was happy that Lute Olson finally got to cut down the nets on Monday night.