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Hoya Hoop Club Blog
Generation Ewing Part II: The first two basketball games that I ever attended were during the 1970 season. My first college basketball game was at Maryland's Cole Field House seeing Georgetown lose in a close game to Maryland 81-71 in the early part of Lefty Driesell's career at Maryland. The next game that I attended was to see the Baltimore Bullets face the Los Angeles Lakers with Wilt Chamberlain and Jerry West also at Cole Field House. I attended both of these games with my father. It helped to start a lifetime love of the game of basketball.
My first two years at Georgetown were filled with many college basketball highlights. There was Craig Shelton and John Duren leading the Hoyas to the NCAA tournament. My classmate, future NBA superstar Eric "Sleepy" Floyd arrived to help lead us to victories over Maryland and their stars Albert King and Buck Williams. e defeated the Roosevelt Bouie and Louis Orr show from Syracuse at Cole Field House in the ECAC tournament to qualify for the NCAA tournament.
In my sophomore year we made a furious second half comeback to defeat the Orangemen in the last game at Manley Field House beginning the greatest rivalry in Eastern Basketball: Georgetown vs. Syracuse. We tied Syracuse and St. John's for the Big East regular season title, and then won the first Big East Tournament in Providence, Rhode Island. We defeated Washington area rival Maryland for the second time that season, but let a 16 point lead slip away against the Big Ten Champion Iowa, and just missed making the Final Four.
In my junior year we lost Big East Conference and Tournament MVP's Craig "Big Sky" Shelton, and John "Baa Baa" Duren to graduation. We lacked the size and rebounding to compete with the elite NCAA teams. However, Coach John Thompson, Jr. used one of his greatest coaching performances to create an exciting, 20-game winning, NCAA-bound team. Eric Smith and Ed Spriggs showed great versatility manning the frontcourt. Eric Floyd provided offense along with an exciting 6'5" freshman point guard from the Bronx, NY, Fred Brown. However, the heart and soul of that team was a freshman guard from McKinley Tech in Washington, D.C. Gene Smith was a defensive specialist schooled by another great defensive guard, former Hoya assistant coach Mike Riley. Gene played a relentless brand of "inside your shirt" defense. In many ways this Hoya team changed the way college basketball is played with 40 minutes of full-court pressure. Every pass and every dribble would be challenged. They would win many big games in McDonough Arena, and were a team that nobody wanted to play. In those days McDonough seated over 4000 people and had no air-conditioning.
During that 1980-81 season, Hoya fans were greatly excited by the recruitment of two Washington, D.C. high school All-Americans: Bill Martin and Anthony Jones. GU had also signed a 6'11" rebounding machine, Ralph Dalton. However, everyone was waiting for the announcement of the #1 high school player in the nation, 7-foot center Patrick Ewing from Jamaica via Cambridge Rinje and Latin High School in the Boston area. With Ralph Sampson dominating college basketball at Virginia, Ewing was heralded as the next great center in the Alcindor, Walton, Bill Russell mold. On February 2, 1981 in a Boston restaurant, Ewing said four words: "I have chosen Georgetown." After the season, athletic director Frank Rienzo and Coach Thompson looked around McDonough Gymnasium and knew that it would be too small for most of its games. The Hoyas would make the Capital Centre its home court. At that time the Capital Centre was a state of the art facility.
During my freshman year, I began making an annual trip to the Capital Centre to see the Capital Classic: a high school all-star game between a group of US all-stars and a group of Washington, D.C. area all-stars. I had lived my freshman year on 4th Loyola. I had attempted to make basketball fans out of my entire floor. We had even turned a few Syracuse natives to cheer for the Blue and Gray. Two years earlier we had seen Ralph Sampson and Dominique Wilkins dominate the Classic. When Ewing, Martin, and Jones had announced that they would play for the Capital all-stars in the Classic, our group from 4th Loyola came together again to charter GUTS buses to the Capital Classic. Our old R.A. Lee Albanese was instrumental in making arrangements. The March 22, 1981 game would mark the beginning of Generation Ewing. I watched in amazement as Martin, Jones, and Ewing threw down 360 dunks during warm-ups. At the end of player introductions, the lights went out as they announced the #1 High School Player in the World: Patrick Ewing. The US team featured Michael Jordan, so the game was a preview of many battles to come. Ewing showed great tenacity leading a second half comeback that came just short of victory.
Generation Ewing would mean three Final Fours and one National Championship in four years. It would also stand for defense, team-play and a belief that you were never going to lose. The 1980-81 team that played such great defense would now have the ultimate defender at the back of their press to intimidate other teams. In a broader sense it symbolized all Georgetown teams in that the team comes first.
This past week the Georgetown Hoyas had two excellent wins in New Jersey against Rutgers and Seton Hall. Any Big East win on the road is important. In last Saturday's loss to Pittsburgh, we lost in spite of 60% shooting from the field. Turnovers, and falling too far behind in the first half would keep our second half rally from bringing us a victory. We must give credit to Pittsburgh which is an excellently balanced team with good senior leadership. I was very impressed by their arena, the Peterson Center. In spite of Pittsburgh's tremendous shooting percentage, the Hoyas would make a great second-half comeback led by #33 Patrick Ewing, Jr. It would be his finest moment to date as a Hoya. He made several key three-point shots, and played some great defense on All-American Center Aaron Gray giving some rest to Hoya center Roy Hibbert. However, his most valuable contributions have been the dirty work that he has taken care of since his arrival at the Hilltop. Patrick has taken many a charge, played tough defense, and grabbed many a loose ball. When I first heard that he was going to wear #33, I was shocked that he would want to have that kind of pressure. However, at Georgetown we have never retired a jersey, even for the great Patrick Ewing. Coach John Thompson, Jr. never believed in that wanting the team to be the first priority over the individual. Generation Ewing back in the 1980's as well as our current Hoya team exemplify this team concept. Generation Ewing stands for tenacity, and never giving up. In today's world with all of the talk about the Princeton offense or the Georgetown offense, it still stands for defense, attacking the boards for rebounds, and fighting for loose balls. As coach John Thompson III stated when he took the job at Georgetown it means: "We are Georgetown!" Whether you are part of Generation Ewing, Generation Laughna, or any other era it means: "We are Georgetown!"
We had another big victory over DePaul last night. The excitement is building for the 100th anniversary of Georgetown Basketball on February 10th. It is going to be quite an event. Many former players are attending games at the Verizon Center. I have a flight to St. Louis early tomorrow morning for business. I will put my check in the mail for the 100th anniversary before I head to the airport. I would not miss the 100th Anniversary Gala for anything. Please come to see another big game this Saturday January 27th against Cincinnati at Verizon Center. For those of you who are Hoya Hoop Club Members please attend our open membership meeting this week:
Hoya Hoop Club Open Membership Meeting
Bernard Muir, our Georgetown Athletic Director, will be on hand to answer questions as will other Hoya Hoop Club Board members. It is the best way to find information about the team and the Hoya Hoop Club. We have really benefited by getting new members and ideas from this meeting every year.
We Are Georgetown!! |
