Color Him Orange by Scott Pitoniak

Author:Scott Pitoniak [Pitoniak, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Triumph Books
Published: 2011-10-16T05:00:00+00:00

9. From Peaks to Valleys

The videotape of the 1987 NCAA title game was stuffed somewhere on the cluttered shelves in Jim Boeheim’s Manley Field House office. And that’s where it would stay for years because the Syracuse basketball coach had no desire to view it. As he prepared for a new basketball season seven months later, he was still agonizing over the squandered opportunities and the dagger-in-the-heart ending of that last-second loss to Indiana. “I don’t know if I’ll ever watch that game,” he said, admitting that he had seen snippets of the tape. “That game just hurts too much. I think about it. I see the players. I can probably see every play in my mind still. But I have no interest in watching it.” Neither did his players. “Someday I can tell my kids about playing [in the championship game],” said junior point guard Sherman Douglas. “I can show them a tape of me playing there…and turn it off for the last minute of the game.”

Clearly, not nearly enough time had passed to heal their wounds. As sophomore forward Derrick Coleman had indicated, it wasn’t merely the loss but the way it had happened—with SU failing to finish the deal at the foul line in the final minute. “We were so close; we had it in our hands,” he lamented. “But we let it slip away. I’d rather lose by 15 or 20 than lose by one shot.” All these months later, visions of Keith Smart’s 16-foot baseline jumper as the clock wound down were still dancing in their heads, gnawing at their souls. “I really felt we should have won that game,” Boeheim said. “A couple of unlucky things happened. We got out there and played defense. They threw up a bad shot and won.”

Luckily for him and his players, the Orangemen were about to embark on another season, and they would do so armed with several experienced stars amid enormous expectations. The Big Three—Douglas, Coleman, and center Rony Seikaly—were back and hungry for a return to the Final Four and a shot at redemption. The idea they might be able to complete unfinished business at Kemper Arena in Kansas City the following March was being trumpeted not only by the admittedly biased citizens of Orange Nation but also by the unbiased members of the national media. SU clearly had reached heights it had never before experienced, finding itself atop the preseason polls of Sports Illustrated, the Sporting News, and the Basketball Writers Association of America. The Sporting News even splashed a photo of Seikaly, the senior center, standing next to a superimposed No. 1, on the cover of its college basketball preview issue.

Douglas embraced the challenge, fueled by the painful memory of the lost title. “We had the whole summer to think about that last game,” he said. “And that’s going to push us. I try not to think about what happened, but I can’t help it. I know when my college career is over that could have been my best chance at a national championship.

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