Enjoy from my personal collection of NCAA Tournament games. I remember several things prior to this Final Four game. The Friday night before, I had stayed up all night writing a term paper for my Honors English class that was due the following Tuesday. As I had a busy weekend ahead of me, I needed to get a lot done on that Friday night, during which I stayed up until five in the morning. My paper was titled, "Who Was Jack the Ripper?" After waking on Saturday morning, I had to coach the Intramural championship game at my grade school. The night before, the team I coached upset the best team in the league. I couldn't celebrate much as I had to get home and work on my paper. On Saturday afternoon, my team would lose to my cousin Brian's team during the championship game, which finished up as the Ohio State and UCONN game tipped off. I remember walking home and catching the second half of this first Final Four game. UCONN was up the whole way, from what I remember, just the better and more talented team than a Ohio State squad that got as far as it could with Scoonie Penn and Michael Redd. As has been the case since 1999, it is pretty hard to beat UCONN when the Huskies reach the Final Four. Ohio State found out firsthand this Saturday. 

Enjoy from my personal collection of NCAA Tournament games. For some reason, this game felt like a Final Four matchup as I watched it some 27 years ago. I was a big fan of both Ohio State and St. John's all season, thinking they both could make surprise runs to the Final Four. Ohio State boasted a dynamic duo of Michael Redd and Scoonie Penn, a Boston College transfer who played for Buckeyes' Head Coach Jim O'Brien when he was the lead man with the Eagles. St. John's was led by Ron Artest, prior to him becoming Metta World Piece, and two very underrated college basketball players, point guard Erick Barkley and shooting guard Bootsy Thornton. From what I remember, this game felt like a nail biter from start to finish, with the Buckeyes taking control late in the second half. I remember enjoying the visual contrast between Ohio State's scarlet uniforms, St. John's white unis and the bright orange court of the Tennessee Volunteers. How the NCAA Tournament used to be so more unique when the courts were not all homogenized. :-) 

Enjoy from my personal collection of NCAA Tournament games. I remember watching the Iowa - Connecticut game and being very impressed with how tough the Hawkeyes were playing the Huskies. All year long I felt that the only team that could possibly defeat prohibitive favorite Duke was UCONN, but the Huskies were given a game by the Hawkeyes during what would be the final game for Head Coach Dr. Tom Davis at the school. I was very happy to see Ohio State pull the upset of an Auburn team that came out of nowhere this season to be a #1 seed. If my memory serves me right, Auburn wasn't even ranked in the top 25 during the preseason. The Tigers were led by the amazing Chris Porter, a forward who was drafted by the Golden State Warriors, I think, but did not play long in the NBA. This was an upset-minded night of tourney games, with the only higher seed winning being UCONN as the lower seeds Ohio State (#4), Gonzaga (#10) and St. John's (#3) all pulled off the "upsets." 

Enjoy from my personal collection of NCAA Tournament games. After upsetting UCLA during the first round, Detroit would not have enough to beat an Ohio State team that was looking like a dark horse to make the Final Four. As for Weber State vs. Florida, I enjoy looking back at this game as the Gators were a year away from making the National Championship Game. It is fun to see freshman Mike Miller along with Udonis Haslem, Brent Wright and Teddy Dupay a year before their tourney run. With Harold Arceneaux and Eddie Gill, the Wildcats would give the Gators a tough game but fall short. Note: The second-round game between Tulsa and Duke is also in this video. Duke absolutely destroyed a Tulsa team coached by Bill Self, who would lead the Golden Hurricane to the Elite Eight during the 2000 NCAA Tournament before leaving that summer to take the Illinois job vacated by Lon Kruger, who was hired by the Atlanta Hawks in the N.B.A. 

Enjoy from my personal collection of NCAA Tournament games. I remember getting home from high school and settling down to watch this first set of Thursday night games. I was a big fan of this Ohio State team with point guard Scoonie Penn and future Milwaukee Buck Michael Redd. I had a sneaky suspicion Ohio State could make a run to the Final Four, which the Buckeyes did, however, not without a tough first-round game from Murray State. If there is one program high majors don't want to play in the opening round, it's Murray State, which took on Illinois in the 2004 NCAA Tournament and defeated Marquette during the 2019 NCAA Tournament. I recall Murray State and Ohio State playing at the RCA Dome, which was my favorite venue for tourney games back in the day. I absolutely loved this shiny court with its red sidelines and baselines.

At the end of this video is the close ending of New Mexico and Missouri. I was rooting against both teams as New Mexico had defeated DePaul in the season opener and Missouri had knocked off Illinois in the Braggin' Rights game in December. The Lobos would move on behind future NBA player Kenny Thomas and a dangerous guard named Lamont Long. Speaking of guards, there is even a little footage of the end of the Penn and Florida game, with the Quakers having a guard named none other than Michael Jordan.