This page was last edited on 22 January 2023, at 21:00. Lorch had been assigned by Lewis to sell the Cougars extra tickets before the game outside the arena. Two months later, the two teams would reunite in the Final Four at the Los Angeles Sports Arena and UCLA burning for revenge, with Alcindor with two good eyes destroyed Houston 101-69. Lost National Final (78-55) versus UCLA. A one-night glimpse into the mammoth promise and shining future of the sport. 1968 NCAA University Division basketball championship game, 1968 NCAA University Division Basketball Championship Game, 1968 NCAA University Division basketball tournament, NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, "UCLA vs. North Carolina Box Score, March 23, 1968", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1968_NCAA_University_Division_basketball_championship_game&oldid=1148301025, This page was last edited on 5 April 2023, at 09:35. The match was historic, the first nationally syndicated college basketball game and the first to play in a domed stadium before more than 52,000 fans. That was January 20, 1968. Find out more. 2023 NCAA | Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. College basketball dictionary: 51 terms defined, 2024 Selection Sunday: Date, schedule, TV times, 2024 March Madness: Men's NCAA tournament schedule, dates, 2023 NCAA bracket: Scores, stats, for March Madness mens tournament, Johnson, Paul appointed to NCAA Division I Mens Basketball Committee, How often fans picked the right NCAA men's champion, every year since 2014, Latest bracket, schedule and scores for the men's tournament, 1 thing to know from every one of the 67 March Madness games, UConn's 2023 title run has cemented its status as a blue blood if it wasn't already, How much experience coaches have when they reach their first Final Four, Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information, Elvin Hayes, Houston: 33.4 points per game, Elvin Hayes, Houston: 19.4 rebounds per game. The SPORTS REFERENCE and STATHEAD trademarks are owned exclusively by Sports Reference LLC. In order to get as many games into this database as quickly as possible, the opponent individual lines are omitted for Hayes, a 6-foot-9 forward, was not directly matched against the 72 Alcindor, but he did block three of Alcindor's shots, and the crowd roared his nickname, "Big E."[4], With two minutes remaining in the game, the score was tied at 69 after the Bruins' Lucius Allen made a pair of free throws. Hayes went on to the NBA, but 17 years later, came back to fulfill a promise to his mother and graduate from the University of Houston. 1 UCLA and No. Straight in there. Line Score. Question, Comment, Feedback, or Correction? 1 team since Feb 20, 2000. On the last possession, UCLA's All-American guard Mike Warren committed a rare mental error deflecting out of bounds a pass meant for UCLA's star shooter Lynn Shackelford, who was unguarded in the corner.[4]. Lew Alcindor of UCLA was named the tournament's Most Outstanding Player for the second of three consecutive years. ", More:Kansas State basketball counting on Nae'Qwan Tomlin to deliver in NCAA battle with Kentucky. Here are the 1968 NCAA tournament leaders (number of games in parentheses): Individual scoring Elvin Hayes, Houston: 33.4 points per game Individual rebounding Elvin Hayes, Houston: 19.4. Logos were compiled by the amazing SportsLogos.net. The Astrodome has long given up its place as a sports destination, though Houston officials are still hoping to come up with some use. Every Sports Reference Social Media Account, Site Last Updated: Monday, May 1, 12:49AM. Won Mideast Regional Final (82-81) versus Kentucky First Round. He is an All-American, and he deserves to be.". Rick Mount, Purdue: 30.5 points per game. Up to that point, only NCAA post-season games had been broadcast nationally, so there was much skepticism regarding where the broadcast would take the non-profit organization's policy. Enter your information to receive emails about offers, promotions from NCAA.com and our partners. All rights reserved. So what does Enberg remember 48 years later? Join our linker program. Next door, NRG Stadium pulsates with Final Four energy this week, but here, the past is an echo and the present is darkness. Or write about sports? The faces of that night begin to vanish. And yet when their teams meet up at 1:40 p.m. CT Sunday in the second round of the NCAA Tournament at Greensboro Coliseum, they have one big thing in common. To make a long story short, Lorch said, I ended up going to jail for the evening.. Houston and Ohio State rounded out the Final Four in 1968. What he needed was one chance to show it, and here it was. Like Johnson, he was a Big 12 all-conference pick and a third-team All-American. . The NCAA semi-final match between the Houston Cougars and UCLA Bruins was a re-match of the college basketball Game of the Century held in January at the Astrodome, in the Cougars' home city. [4] Hayes, playing with four fouls in the second half, scored two free throws. Duke biggest winner in latest D1Baseball rankings. "We we're going to have to figure something out. Television ads were being sold in the first half to be read over the air in the second. Thats when he ran into some LA plainclothes police, on the lookout for scalpers. So what they did to accommodate those that bought lower box seats, they dug foxholes in the floor and the press and the broadcasters were in foxholes so they didnt obstruct the view. Those games were at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, on the same floor used in the Astrodome game. All rights reserved. [7], The January 1968 cover of Sports Illustrated depicted the game, with Hayes shooting over Alcindor. Notre Dame 62, Army 58. College basketball had grabbed the nations attention for one night by being on TV coast to coast. 2 Houston closed with the Cougars up by three points. Einhorn made a huge mark in TV sports, and later as one of the owners of the Chicago White Sox. I want to make the game plan as simple as possible for our guys so we can play with freedom, and I'm sure (Calipari) wants to do the same with his.". Just for historical reference, I did what amounted to be the very first national telecast of the NCAA Finals and that was in 1961, when Cincinnati played Ohio State in Kansas City. He was so far ahead of anyone in television at the time. Question, Comment, Feedback, or Correction? Our reasoning for presenting offensive logos. UCLA. . Won East Regional Final (70-66) versus Davidson ", More:Three takeaways from Kansas State basketball's NCAA Tournament win against Montana State. 1968 College Basketball NIT Tournament (16 teams) Updated June 29, 2018 | Infoplease Staff. The Bruins arrived in Houston with a 47-game, two-and-a-half-season winning streak. Logos were compiled by the amazing SportsLogos.net. Watch our How-To Videos to Become a Stathead, Subscribe to Stathead and get access to more data than you can imagine. Four Factors. Our reasoning for presenting offensive logos. But the launching pad for the incredible popularity of college basketball on television, I believe, started right there in Houston, close to NASA. He had a staggering 25 rebounds Friday in Kentucky's 61-53 first-round victory over Providence. Copyright 2000-2023 Sports Reference LLC. Chapin, Dwight - How Wooden Stopped the Big E. 2007-2008 UCLA Men's Basketball Media Guide - PDF copy available at www.uclabruins.com. "So it's, OK, we are coming at you, and they do a great job of trapping the post and creating opportunities to steal balls and be disruptive. There was an enormity about it, everything from the Astrodome to the meaningfulness of these two great basketball teams.. Villanova 77, Wyoming 66. Copyright 2000-2023 Sports Reference LLC. We ran down the ramp and they had a red carpet all the way out on the field. UCLA had prevailed against Houston 7358, and won their 3rd NCAA championship. But the root of it all is sitting right there next to it.. Schedules prior to the 1994-95 season may be missing games vs. non-Division I opponents. K-State (24-9) essentially starts four guards Johnson is 6-6 and can guard multiple positions and score at all three levels and lanky 6-10 forward Nae'Qwan Tomlin, who is just comfortable on the perimeter as he is in the paint. United States: University of Illinois Press, 2013. NCAA Men's Tournament Scores Mar 22, 1968. For the fifth time in program history, UConn is heading to the NCAA men's national championship game. All logos are the trademark & property of their owners and not Sports Reference LLC. In 2008, the NCAA deal with CBS to televise the entire tournament was worth $545 million.[24][25]. Houston and UCLA had met in the previous season in the semifinals of the 1967 NCAA Tournament. GREENSBORO, N.C. One is a 6-foot-9, 260-pound immovable object and the other weighs 160 soaking wet and by his own admission is "5-7 on a good day.". [3], Ted Nance, the sports information director for the University of Houston, put the schedule together. One game could do all that? San Antonio Express-News, January 19, 2008, 196768 Houston Cougars men's basketball team, 196768 UCLA Bruins men's basketball team, National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, UCLA-Houston Game of the Century still leaves impression 50 years later, "Game of the century: UH's basketball victory over UCLA in the Astrodome stands the test of time", "It's been 20 years since they've played The Game of the Century", "Funeral in Downey today for UCLA player Edgar Lacey", "The Final Four's Complicated History With Domes", Phi Slama Jama: The greatest team to never win it all, The Game of the Century: Looking back 40 years, `GAME OF THE CENTURY'/A boon for college basketball, a bust for spectators, `GAME OF THE CENTURY'/Game now unimportant, says Hayes, Game of the Century retrospective blog (Alan Reifman), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Game_of_the_Century_(college_basketball)&oldid=1135133269. Top women's NCAA basketball . Won National Third Place (89-85) versus Houston. The roar at the end just reverberated throughout that big dome. Do you have a blog? That's what he does. Here are the 1969 NCAA tournament leaders (number of games in parentheses): Andy Wittry has written for Stadium, SI.com, Sporting News, the Indianapolis Star, Louisville Courier-Journal and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "We have individual comps, like each (Kentucky) guy plays similar to another. ", More:How to watch Kansas State basketball's second-round NCAA Tournament game vs. Kentucky. They were leaping over our foxholes like the return to the Alamo or something.. [5][6] Einhorn paid $27,000 for the broadcast rights on TVS. Similarly, K-State has yet to face anyone quite like Tshiebwe, a double-double machine, last year's college player of the year, who averages 16.2 points and leads the nation with 13.5 rebounds per game. 2 ranked Bruins winning 10169 against the No. Every Sports Reference Social Media Account, Site Last Updated: Monday, May 1, 12:49AM. He saw how truly big college basketball could be, and had a major hand in making all that happen. "It sounds like they've got a big guy at every position, and we've got a little guy at every position," he said with a laugh. National - National Semifinal. Have we played anybody that plays like them?". 2023 NCAA | Turner Sports Interactive, Inc. Coach Guy V. Lewis talks with UCLA coach John Wooden prior to the Game of the Century on Jan. 20, 1968. 1 seed will play in the Elite Eight of the NCAA tournament. . 2007-2008 UCLA Men's Basketball Media Guide - PDF copy available at www.uclabruins.com. For K-State, which does not start a true post player, trying to keep Tshiebwe off the glass most likely will be a group project. The best game a John Wooden team ever played, Enberg said. Alcindor, a senior, was named the Final Four's Most Outstanding Player for the third consecutive year, while Purdue's Rick Mount led all scorers with 122 points in the tournament. I think Cal is a guy who they do what they do. . We have tools and resources that can help you use sports data. And he threw in six rebounds and three steals for good measure. Let Enberg take it from there. He can be reached atagreen@gannett.comor on Twitter at @arnegreen. Do you have a blog? There are various versions of the original light bulb. It began on March 8, 1968, and ended with the championship game on March 23 in Los Angeles, California.