A Season on the Brink

by John Feinstein

  Phelps was mollified. Indiana played zone most of the game. It was Hammel who asked the question in the postgame press conference: “What about the zone?”

  “What zone?” Knight answered with a straight face. “Did you see a zone out there?”

  If the Notre Dame game did nothing else, it showed how far Knight had come in terms of flexibility. The once man-to-man, walk-it-up, don’t-recruit-outside-the-Midwest, don’t-touch-JUCOs and don’t-redshirt-players coach had in one night played zone, pushed the ball up the floor, started two Californians (Hillman and Garrett), two JUCOs (Garrett and Smart) and played three redshirts of a year before (Hillman, Smith and Pelkowski).

  Living proof that you can teach an old coach new tricks.

  Kentucky was next at home, and the 71–66 victory was a sweet one even though the Wildcats weren’t nearly the team they had been the previous season. This was revenge for the bitter loss in Lexington on the night that Alford had been suspended by the NCAA because of his posing for the sorority charity calendar.

  Knight had talked the previous year about announcing that he was canceling the Kentucky series after beating them—he would never make such an announcement after a loss—but he had changed his mind by the time the two teams played this game.

  “I think [Eddie] Sutton will run the program a hell of a lot differently than [Joe B.] Hall did,” Knight said after the game, a reference to published reports of payoffs to players during Hall’s tenure. “If he does, then this will continue to be a hell of a rivalry.”

  It was a not-so-subtle message. Knight was willing to take Sutton’s word that he was going to clean the program up—for now—after a victory. Time would tell.

  The Hoosiers were now 3–0. As always, the Notre Dame and Kentucky games had been draining.

  Knight always worried about the game that followed Notre Dame and Kentucky, regardless of the opponent. One year earlier, the Hoosiers had come up flat at home against Kansas State and had almost lost to a team that would finish that season at the bottom of the Big Eight. Now, they had to go on the road to Vanderbilt.

  The opponent itself made the game unusual. Knight does not normally like to play against friends, and C.M. Newton was a friend. He had been one of Knight’s assistant coaches with the Olympic team. But playing Indiana at home was a coup for Newton as he tried to rebuild the Vanderbilt program. Beating the Hoosiers would be a breakthrough.

  For Vanderbilt, the game was a breakthrough; for Indiana, a nightmare. The Hoosiers led by nine early in the second half but couldn’t hold on. With Vandy guard Barry Goheen running wild for twenty-six points and the crowd roaring, Vandy pulled the upset, 79–75. Knight was gracious afterwards, crediting Newton and his players. “I know they’ve built toward something like this,” he said. “I hate to see it be us, but I’m happy for them. We just didn’t deserve to win the basketball game.”

  That was the message Knight took back to his players: they had not deserved to win the basketball game. The next two days were a return to the bad old days. There was BK Theater, lots of screaming and yelling, and a mass kickout/harangue on Thursday. Part of this was a result of the Vanderbilt loss. Part of it was the upcoming weekend. It was Indiana Classic time again, the thirteenth annual tournament in which Indiana invites three teams to come play patsy for it.

  The opening-night opponent for Indiana was North Carolina-Wilmington, not exactly a name that would get the same reaction from the players as Notre Dame or Kentucky. Knight juggled his lineup, starting Sloan, Pelkowski and freshman David Minor. Smart and Garrett were on the bench.

  As always, playing a no-name team made Knight nervous. He had good reason. After playing a good first half and leading 43–29, the Hoosiers collapsed in the second half.

  With center Brian Rowsom running another 35 points, 18 rebounds—UNC-W came back. And came back. It got to within 73–72 with thirty-eight seconds left, and UNC-W even had the last shot, a squared seventeen-footer by Rowsom. But the ball spun out, and one of the most embarrassing upsets in Indiana history had been averted.

  Knight didn’t even stick around for the press conference. He sent Wright, who explained Knight had left to go watch Patrick play.

  If there was going to be a major explosion it was likely to come after a victory like this one. A lead had been blown against a team that should have been blown out. This, three nights after a loss. But Knight didn’t go wild, didn’t rant or rave. The walk-through on Saturday morning was firm but calm. The Hoosiers—with Garrett and Smart restored to the starting lineup—came out flying against East Carolina in the final. It was 49–22 at halftime, and the final was 96–68.

  What was most remarkable was what Knight said after the game. “We didn’t come back well after Vanderbilt, and that was my fault. We were too hard on them and went after it too hard.”

  My fault? Went after them too hard? Was this really Bob Knight talking?

  It was. This was a Knight who had started the process of trying to be more patient almost from the moment he hurled the chair. He had made some progress in ’86. Now, with a good team that he knew was playing hard even when it didn’t play well, Knight was as calm (for him) as he had ever been in his coaching career.

  The rest of December went smoothly. Calloway, whose injury had not proved as serious as first feared, returned for the More-head State game, an easy 84–62 victory. Louisville was next, another revenge game. Like Kentucky, the Cardinals, defending national champions, were not nearly the same team that had beaten Indiana a year earlier.

  Even so, the game wasn’t easy. Alford was 4-for-17, and Louisville led 49–42 with 9:07 to play. But Indiana strung eleven straight points together, capping the rally on a leap-and-lean three-point play by Calloway with 6:36 left. The lead was 53–49, and IU coasted from there to win, 67–58. After that came two easy victories in the Hoosier Classic. The record going into Big Ten play was 9–1.

  It had been four years since Indiana had won a Big Ten title. The 1983 team, led by Ted Kitchel and Randy Wittman, had won the league the season before Alford, Thomas and Meier had arrived as freshmen. No group of Knight-coached seniors had ever left Indiana without a Big Ten championship. Knight reminded them of this fact. That would be one of his themes throughout the next eighteen games, getting a Big Ten championship for the three seniors.

  The start was shaky. Playing at Ohio State should not have been that tough a task. Indiana had beaten a more talented Buckeye team twice in 1986. This team had a new coach, though, the very aggressive Gary Williams. But with Dennis Hopson, who would go on to beat Alford out for Big Ten Player of the Year honors, struggling with the flu (four points in ten minutes), it should have been easy.

  It wasn’t. Indiana blew a seventeen-point lead and actually trailed 75–74 with 4:26 left. But, as would become part of their pattern, the Hoosiers righted themselves just in time and blew to an easy 92–80 victory down the stretch. It was a road win and, struggle or no struggle, a better start than last year’s 0–2 that had led to Knight’s fishing trip in Assembly Hall.

  They won easily at Michigan State and then went to Michigan for a Monday night TV game. This had been the scene of the most embarrassing loss of the year before, the 80–52 debacle in the regular-season Big Ten showdown finale.

  Knight does not easily forget such a loss. His memories of that afternoon and of the taunting Michigan fans were vivid. He reminded the players about the embarrassment several times prior to the rematch.

  Once again, it looked simple. With Alford hot, the Hoosiers ran off a 12–2 string at the end of the first half and led 51–34. The Michigan fans, who had been all over Knight at the start of the game, were quiet. But the lead didn’t hold. Garrett was being outplayed inside by the lumbering Mark Hughes, and Michigan’s three guards kept knocking in jump shots. The lead dwindled quickly. The crowd was berserk.

  It was still 80–71 with 3:50 left. But the Wolverines were on a 12–1 skein, and when Gary Grant nailed a jumper with 1:07 left, Michigan led 83–81
. A fourth straight loss to Michigan? Unthinkable. And yet, as the players leaned into the huddle to hear Knight yelling to be heard over the crowd, the possibility was quite real.

  With forty-five seconds left Eyl was fouled. Eyl, the nonfree throw shooter of a year ago, would have had no chance in such a situation. Now, he calmly made both shots to tie the game at 83 apiece.

  But with eight seconds left, Eyl drew his fifth foul, on Grant. The first free throw was good for 84–83. The second missed. Knight called time. His message in the huddle was simple and direct. “Steve,” he said to Alford, “I want you to take the ball and score. Not shoot, score. Understand?”

  Alford understood. He went the length of the floor, spun at the side of the lane and put up a twelve-footer. It rolled around the rim, hesitated and dropped in with one second left. It was 85–84. Michigan couldn’t get a shot.

  It should be remembered that Knight has walked off the floor after winning national championships without so much as cracking a smile. Now, he turned to the crowd behind him, thrust his arms high and leaped into the air, shaking a fist. He was overjoyed. He ran—yes, ran—from the floor, still celebrating.

  Someone asked Alford later if he had ever seen his coach that happy. “Not even close,” Alford answered.

  They bombed Wisconsin and Northwestern at home. Their Big Ten record was 5–0. Iowa, at Iowa, was next. Indiana had already avenged three of the previous year’s losses—Kentucky, Louisville, Michigan. This was another chance. Iowa had bombed IU in Iowa City two years in a row. Now, under rookie coach Tom Davis, the Hawkeyes were unbeaten and ranked No. 1 in the nation. Indiana was No. 3.

  Iowa was ready for Indiana. The Hawkeyes led 34–22, before the Hoosiers closed to 46–44 at halftime. Indiana led briefly in the second half, but Iowa turned the jets up again, destroying IU inside. The final rebounding margin was an extraordinary 46–19. The final score was an equally amazing 101-88. It was amazing because it marked the first time in Knight’s twenty-two years as a coach that an opponent had scored 100 points on one of his teams. Even though the screwy three-point rule skewed matters, Iowa would have scored ninety-seven without the rule. That was lots of points.

  A year earlier, after the loss at Iowa, Knight had raged through the trip to Minnesota, and the Hoosiers had almost lost to a crippled Minnesota team. There was no rage now, just a message: “We have to keep winning until we get to play Iowa at home.” They began with a romp, 77–53, at Minnesota.

  They kept going the following week with tough but solid victories at home over Illinois and Purdue. The Purdue victory was particularly impressive because the Boilermakers had won three of four from Indiana coming in, and the only IU victory had been the Miracle at Coogan’s Bluff game the year before, when Purdue had scored only one point in the last nine minutes and IU, with the whole front line out of the game, scraped to a 71–70 overtime victory.

  This time, it was easy. Indiana took the lead for good on two Alford free throws with 16:17 left and led by as many as seventeen before easing to an 88–77 win. The record was now 17–2.

  The Michigans came to town the following week. Naturally, the players were reminded time and again about the fact that they had lost to both these teams at home two years in a row. But this was a very different team than the ones that had lost those four games. What’s more, the Michigans had lost players like Sam Vincent and Scott Skiles (State) and Roy Tarpley and Butch Wade and Richard Rellford (Michigan).

  Michigan State hung tough most of the night, cutting a fifteen-point lead to five with 3:44 left. But Alford just kept hitting shot after shot. When it was over, Indiana had an 84–80 win, and Alford had a career-high forty-two points. After the game Knight sounded as if he was talking about Buckner when Alford’s name came up.

  “We won it because Steve Alford plays for us,” he said. “He’s an all-American and he played like an All-American . . . . Without Alford, Michigan State wins the ball game going away. Steve’s played that way since he was a freshman [What!?] He’s remarkable for the kind of athlete he is to be able to produce what he does.”

  Reading these comments in the paper the next morning, Alford undoubtedly thought that perhaps it would be reasonable to suggest that the next time the team was drug-tested, the head coach join the line.

  “I’m almost as good right now,” he joked, “as Damon.”

  Damon as in Damon Bailey, the boy-wonder eighth-grader Knight had fallen in love with the previous season. Damon was now a freshman at Bedford High School, and would lead that team to the state Final Four in March. He was playing superbly, averaging twenty-three points a game. Knight had gone back to see him play, and was already setting Alford up as Bailey’s role model. Damon and his family were frequently at home games, and in the locker room afterwards. Knight even had Alford take Damon and his family to dinner one night.

  Three days after Michigan State, Alford was “held” to thirty points by Michigan. This game was an old-fashioned blowout, the Hoosiers for once building a big halftime lead and then pulling away, leading by as many as twenty-four points before winning 83–67.

  After the game, Knight was asked on CBS-TV if he thought this team was good enough to win the national championship. “I’ve coached teams that good,” he said. “I don’t think this one is.”

  Maybe not, but the Hoosiers were doing a decent imitation. They were 19–2 heading into what should be an easy stretch: games at Northwestern and Wisconsin and a home game with Minnesota before the rematch with Iowa. The three weakest teams in the league. No problem. As it turned out, the next ten days would be the most difficult and traumatic of the season.

  To think that Northwestern might be the site for an Indiana debacle was a joke. The Wildcats were starting from scratch under rookie coach Bill Foster, and were destined to finish the season 7–21. The score in Bloomington had been an embarrassing 95–43, and it could have been worse.

  But from the beginning everything went wrong. The Hoosiers led the entire first half, but could never gain control. Alford was one-for-five. Jeff Grose, the 1985 Mr. Indiana who seemed to struggle against everyone but Indiana, came off the bench to score eight points. The half ended with a dunk by the Northwestern center that cut the margin to 34–32.

  That was bad enough. What was worse was the Northwestern band. At Northwestern, the band sits adjacent to the visiting team’s bench. It likes to chant things at the opponents, get things riled up a little. Naturally, the band had plenty to say to Knight throughout the half. As he walked past the bleachers where the band was seated at halftime, one band member kept yelling over and over, “Knight, you suck.”

  Most of the time Knight just keeps his head down and ignores such clever repartee. But with the team playing poorly, his rabbit ears were on. Suddenly, he stopped a few feet from the youngster, reached over the railing, grabbed him and tried to yank him out of the bleachers.

  Dakich, trailing Knight by a couple of feet, immediately grabbed his coach and tried to pull him away. Knight, angry, is a handful. Dakich was able to keep Knight from doing any damage, but he couldn’t pull him loose. Finally, Wright, who had turned around in the hallway and found that he had lost Knight, raced back and used his 6–8 bulk to pry both Knight and Dakich loose. He pulled them into the hallway.

  “Let go of me, Goddammit,” Knight screamed. “Let go!” Wright and Dakich let go. But the incident wasn’t over. Knight sought out a campus policeman. Pointing to the youngster, Knight said, “If he’s still here when we come back for the second half, there won’t be a second half.”

  Then he left for the locker room. The police removed the offender. The Hoosiers played the second half—barely. They hung on to win 77–75, only because Thomas scored thirty-two points on a night when Alford was four-for-thirteen and Dean Garrett produced three points and three rebounds.

  Knight was wild in the locker room afterwards. At one point, he grabbed a stat sheet and pushed it up against Garrett’s chest. “Three rebounds,” he roared. “Three!” The
n, turning to Wright, he said, “You ever recruit another junior college pussy like this one and I’ll fire you!”

  Knight also berated the media for doubting him when he said the team wasn’t that good. He ripped Garrett and Alford. (“We got absolutely nothing out of Alford tonight.”) It was unfortunately like old times, including the old question about Knight’s self-control.

  What if Dakich, who was on the trip (graduate assistants rarely travel) only because Chicago is near his home, hadn’t been right behind Knight when he went after the band member? What if Knight had succeeded in yanking him from the bleachers? What then? Woody Hayes II? After working for two years to get away from such outbursts, Knight had almost wiped himself out in one frustrating swoop.

  It didn’t get much better at Wisconsin. Alford’s first basket of the game made him the school’s all-time leading scorer, but he would finish the night four-for-nineteen. Suddenly, after being unable to miss against the Michigans, he couldn’t buy a shot. In practice, the shots were dropping as they always did. But in games, he was missing and missing badly. Usually when Alford misses, the ball rims out. Now, he was chipping paint off the rims.

  Indiana should have lost to Wisconsin. The Hoosiers trailed by six with four minutes left in regulation and through much of the three overtimes. But Garrett saved the game by grabbing a Hillman air ball from the corner and banking it in with four seconds to go for an 86–85 miracle. The imprint of the stat sheet undoubtedly still on his chest, Garrett had produced twenty-one points and eleven rebounds.

  Playing Minnesota at home was no easier. There were fourteen lead changes and twenty ties before Garrett played hero again, making two free throws with three seconds to go for a 72–70 victory. Alford’s slump continued. He was seven-for-twenty. That made fifteen-for-fifty-two in three games. He had not shot that poorly since about fourth grade.