Much of my COVID-19 replacement sports-viewing has concentrated on vintage soccer films via YouTube (those Dutch teams of the ’70s were really something). But I did indulge earlier this month in a replay of the 1985 NCAA Championship between Villanova and Georgetown, on the CBS Sports Network. I think it’s accurate to say that between 1974 and 2004 (the period of my most fervid college basketball mania), this is the only final I failed to watch live — and only because I was backpacking through Europe at the time, behind the Iron Curtain. When I finally got a hold of an International Herald Tribune in Dubrovnik (the former Yugoslavia), I thought maybe Tito’s media censors were messing with me. In all the years since, I’ve seen highlights but never the entire game tape. Some thoughts:
• By now everyone knows that Villanova won this game (66-64) by shooting an extraordinary 22 of 28 from the floor: 78.6 percent. That’s plenty mindboggling (they went 22 of 27 or 81.5 percent from the line). All the John Thompson teams from this era were renowned for their swarming defense. They performed as advertised here, forcing the Wildcats into 17 turnoversn(!) and just 28 field goal attempts. In a 40-minute basketball game, that is not a lot, folks. Nova just made everything. It was nearly the case that on each possession in this game, Rollie Massimino’s team either scored the ball or threw it away. I’ve never seen an offensive performance quite like it.
• This was the last game of the “No Shot Clock” era; the NCAA went to a 35-second possession meter the following season. Villanova never went to a four corners against Georgetown but the Wildcats were extremely deliberate on offense (in part because they were throwing it away or having it stolen with such frequency — on account of the defensive pressure). At one point in the second half, CBS flashed a stat on the screen showing “Time of Possession,” the sort of thing you’d see today during a soccer match. I don’t remember this stat from the 1970s or ‘80s, at all. But it was damned relevant here. Villanova basically possessed the ball twice as long as Georgetown did.
• The Cats essentially contested this entire game with 5 guys. Massimino started a guard named Dwight Wilbur, who went the first 5 minutes, came out and never returned. (I thought maybe he’d been hurt, but he says otherwise.) Mark Plansky played 1 minute (there were three Plansky brothers from Wakefield, Mass.; I later covered state tournament games involving the younger two). The immortal Chuck Everson played 3 minutes — long enough to get punched in the face by Reggie Williams as the first half ended. This wasn’t some hidden rabbit punch. Everyone saw it, including the TV cameras. No call.