It's March, and the madness is already well underway.
The NCAA men's basketball tournament is a fixture in my life, going back to my childhood. My parents, both Indiana University graduates, instilled in my sister and me their love of all things IU. Naturally, this included that most beloved of Hoosier sports: basketball.
Growing up, the only IU coach I knew was Bob Knight. Even though I was only in my teens, I can still clearly remember the 1976 team romping through its undefeated season, a feat unmatched since then by any other NCAA men's basketball champion. The 1981 NCAA championship is another bright memory, coming as it did during my senior year at the University of Evansville.
Indiana and Kentucky are like oil and water. They don't go together ... especially not in basketball. Yet, in me they do. I am a Kentucky fan, have been since 1992.
This makes me something of a black sheep in my family, or at least an oddity. No one else would even think of rooting for Kentucky, a long-hated rival.
So how did this happen? Timing is everything. So is location.
In the spring of 1987, I landed my first reporting job at The Messenger, a daily paper in Madisonville, Kentucky. It's hard to be an Indiana fan in Kentucky. But that year, it was easy because Indiana won the NCAA championship, in what would turn out to be their last one to date. Silently, I gloated as the Kentucky fans all around me wailed. For them, the only thing worse than Kentucky losing was Indiana winning.
Then came the 1988-89 season at the University of Kentucky, which brought with it the Emery envelope recruiting scandal and subsequent NCAA investigation. In its cover story, Sports Illustrated called it "Kentucky's Shame." Coach Eddie Sutton resigned, and the NCAA handed UK three years' probation, a two-year ban from postseason play and a ban from live television in 1989-90. It looked like the glory days of UK basketball were over.
Meanwhile, I was finding it harder and harder to remain an IU fan. As Bob Knight's behavior became more and more erratic, his words and actions chafed at my sense of fair play, of how people should treat one another. No one in a position of power should be above it all, where the rules that govern most of us don't apply to them. Is it fair that this eroded my kinship with the IU men's basketball program? Probably not, but it did.
As Bob Knight's star fell, another coach's star was rising. Rick Pitino had taken over as head coach at UK. In that first year of probation, Kentucky games were not televised, so I was left to hear and read about this exciting young coach who was making UK basketball fun again. In 1990 and 1991, UK was also banned from postseason play, so once the regular season ended, that was it. No March Madness for them.
Then came 1992, and "The Unforgettables" ... a team with one supremely talented sophomore, Jamal Mashburn, and four genuinely unforgettable seniors: Sean Woods, John Pelphrey, Richie Farmer and Deron Feldhaus. Those four stuck with the program after countless others had bailed out. Their loyalty would prove endearing not only to Kentucky fans, but to so many who watched what is considered one of the greatest NCAA basketball games of all time: the 1992 East Regional final against Duke.
Kentucky had advanced to the Elite Eight, and many considered this a huge accomplishment, coming as it did on the heels of probation. Duke was expected to crush Kentucky and cruise to the Final Four. Instead, this game was a fight to the finish, both teams refusing to give in. When Sean Woods made his shot with only two seconds to go, giving Kentucky a one-point lead, many thought it was all over, and Kentucky had pulled off a miraculous upset. Instead, as the final seconds ticked away, Grant Hill launched a cross-court pass to Christian Laettner, who caught it, dribbled, turned and scored the winning jump shot, thrusting a dagger in the hearts of Kentucky Wildcat fans.
I was one of them. Heartbroken, I fell in love with that team. I've been a fan ever since.
Kentucky went on to win the NCAA championship in 1996, something that was expected of "The Untouchables," a roster which featured nine future NBA stars, and was effectively two teams deep. But the NCAA final was not a cake walk for them, so winning the championship felt more like relief than joy. But Kentucky basketball was back on top!
More delightful was the 1998 NCAA championship, which was not at all expected. It was Orlando "Tubby" Smith's first year as head coach at Kentucky, and this team was not loaded with talent as their predecessors had been. The 1998 team often found themselves trailing in games, only to pull ahead in the second half. Still, they gutted it out, and made their tournament run a memorable one. Along the way, they got revenge against Duke, winning the South Regional final ... but only after pulling ahead, for the first time in the game, in the final two minutes. That's just the way this team rolled, all the way to the championship title.
Kentucky has endured some uneven years, and a couple of miserable ones, in the interim. Then John Calipari took over in 2010, and coached Kentucky to an eighth NCAA championship in 2012. I'm not a fan of the "one and done" system. I like to get to know my teams longer than just one year. But I also respect the success Calipari has been able to maintain, while essentially rebuilding his teams year after year.
Tonight, Kentucky lost to the University of North Carolina Tarheels, who look to be on their way to their sixth NCAA championship. It was a memorable game, reminiscent of that Kentucky-Duke matchup 25 years ago, and also won on a last-second jumper. Both teams gave it their all, and left everything on the court. I don't feel as dismal as I did back in 1992. But I'm still a little surprised at how strong and enduring those Kentucky ties remain.
