This is another fun game. I can’t find any video on it so the only reason I’m mentioning it is because I was there at Welsh-Ryan arena and it was a lively entertaining game:
To set the stage, NU was still looking for its first ever NCAA appearance, and people were saying that NU needed to win this game to have a shot. The atmosphere was extremely lively and very un-Northwestern like. It was a back and forth game throughout. THJ hit a 3 to tie it with 1:46 left and then the teams traded misses and TOs including a missed 3 to win it from Burke as time ran out. In OT, Michigan hit 3 straight 3’s to silence the crowd and then hit a bunch of FTs to keep their big lead and won by 12. The crowd was frenzied to start the OT, but by the end only Michigan fans were left. Good times.
As it turned out, Michigan needed that win to get their share of the Big Ten title. And Northwestern finished exactly 1 home win over Michigan away from making the tourney. Oh well.
sad to report that it looks like michigan scored nine points on threes in that OT rather than they hit nine consecutive threes - i was like “how do i not remember michigan having a 30-point OT?!”
Does anyone have a link to a couple of games from the 87-88 or 86-87 seasons? As much as I loved seeing Rice dominate scoring in the 88-89 season, his rebounding was almost as much fun to watch during the two previous seasons.
I also thought the 87-88 team was just as talented and perhaps a little better than the 88-89 NC team, they just couldn’t get it done in the NCAA tourney.
That year Rice was a rebounding and scoring demon, Grant played at an AA level and excelled at scoring, assists and defense, Mills and Robinson were starting to live up to their recruiting rankings… Consider how good that team could have been if it was Mills’ and Robinson’s second year on the court. They had to sit out their freshman year due to Prop 48 and their sophomore year was their first on the court.
I remember that shot vividly as I went wild in an empty TGI Friday’s in Boston, MA on a random winter night. Had some drinks with some grad school friends after a regular day of class and that game was on 1 TV in the corner and I mostly kept tabs on it and went nuts when that went down. My friends had no idea what was going on, other than knowing I was from Michigan.
I was there as a student. One of the top moment as a student and I remember desperately wanting to see them making the NCAA. I was sick and tired of NIT or not being good enough for either tournaments.
