UCLA's 88 Game Winning Streak Is On the Line
#1 UCLA battled #2 Notre Dame in South Bend on January 19, 1974
Introduction from The Sports Time Traveler™
The Sports Time Traveler™ is back here in 1974, precisely 50 years ago, where streaking is on the verge becoming popular.
In golf, Johnny Miller has won the first two PGA TOUR events of the year and fired an opening round 62 for a 4 shot lead in Tucson in the 3rd event of the new season. More on that to come in another article.
And UCLA and Bill Walton are continuing their phenomenal streaks in college basketball.
I first wrote about the UCLA streak in January, 1973 when they broke the NCAA record for consecutive wins of 60 in a victory at Notre Dame:
UCLA Plays Notre Dame for a Chance at a Record
In March, I wrote about UCLA’s victory in the 1973 NCAA Championship Game which extended the streak to 75:
The Mountain Man Meets Memphis State
Last month I shared the story of UCLA’s showdown with undefeated N.C. State:
Big Red vs. The Skywalker
The victory over N.C. State put the streak at 79 games.
But soon after the big win over the Wolfpack, the UCLA Bruins hit a crisis. The soul of the team, 6’11” Bill Walton, possibly the greatest player in college basketball history, went down with an injured back.
On Tuesday, January 8, 1974, the headline of the sports section in the Los Angeles Times read, “UCLA wins 85th. Bill Walton Hurt.”
Playing at Washington State, the Bruins were leading 49 - 33 with 10 and a half minutes to go in the game when Walton, “crash landed under the basket,” according the Los Angeles Times reporter Jeff Prugh. Walton was unable to return for the remainder of the game.
Without Walton on the court, the Wizard of Westwood, UCLA coach John Wooden, deployed a tactic he personally finds deplorable. He went into a stall to preserve the lead. UCLA scored only 6 more points the rest of the way and escaped with a 55 - 45 victory.
Walton’s injury was worse than initially feared. He couldn’t play in the Bruins next 3 games. But he wasn’t needed in those contests against weaker teams. UCLA beat California (7 - 7) 92 - 56, Stanford (5 - 6) 66 - 52 and Iowa (4 - 7) 68 - 44.
Coming into this weekend in 1974, UCLA has won 88 straight games. And senior Bill Walton had never lost a game in his college career. Walton’s teams had won 139 consecutive games in which he had played going back to high school, including all 80 games he has played in at the varsity college level. It was the most remarkable personal winning streak in major American sports.
But it was all on the line against #2, and undefeated, Notre Dame.
If Bill Walton couldn’t play, Jimmy the Greek had the Fighting Irish as a 4 point favorite to stop the streak.
However Big Red was determined to play in the big game. And so he suited up in South Bend. Whether he would actually play was going to be a game time decision by the wizard - coach John Wooden.
Notre Dame fans were in a frenzy in South Bend, Indiana for the match up. Just 3 weeks earlier, the Notre Dame football team had defeated #1 Alabama in the Sugar Bowl in a dramatic come from behind 24 - 23 win to capture the national title capping off an undefeated season for the Irish, their first since 1949.
A win against UCLA would give Notre Dame both the #1 football and basketball teams at the same time.
At this point in time, that is a feat that had never been accomplished.
Naturally, I just had to go back to South Bend, to the campus of Notre Dame, to experience this game.
UCLA's 88 Game Winning Streak Is On the Line
SOUTH BEND, IN - January 23, 1974
Last weekend on the campus of Notre Dame University, a sellout crowd of 11,400 of the most excited fans you can imagine jammed the Athletic and Convocation Center on the campus of Notre Dame.
Energized by the recent upset victory by Notre Dame’s football team 3 weeks ago, the arena was rocking.
You can hear and feel the near delirium of the fans in this video of the start of the game.
Here are the time stamps on the video to take a look at:
2:00 - UCLA coach John Wooden tells announcer Dick Enberg that he doesn’t know yet if Bill Walton will play. Walton has not played since falling hard on his back 2 weeks ago during a game.
5:10 - The crowd is on fire as the Notre Dame starters are announced.
9:10 - Freshman Adrian Dantly’s put back under the basket ties the game at 2 - 2 in the opening minute and the crowd goes wild. Bill Walton has started the game. But just a minute into the contest he is bleeding from his mouth and play has to be stopped.
12:00 - Walton stuffs Dantly. Walton seems fine on the court. There seems to be no sign of the injury to his back or his mouth holding him back.
16:30 - Keith “Jamaal” Wilkes displays why his nickname is silk with a smooth jumper that is beautiful to watch and clearly an NBA ready move. UCLA goes up 12 - 8.
18:15 - Walton puts in an alley oop and UCLA leads 14 - 9.
18:44 - Dantly shows how tough he can be as he scores after recovering a loose ball in the lane. UCLA leads 14 - 11.
The tape cuts to the end of the first half at this point.
UCLA went up by 17 points in the 1st half, but Notre Dame rallied to make it a 5 point game before UCLA extended the lead to 43 - 34 at the half.
Walton played the entire first half and scored 12 points. Wilkes had 10 for UCLA. As a team, UCLA hit 70% of their field goal attempts.
Gary Brokaw led Notre Dame with 12. John Shumate had 8 and Dantly had 7 in the first half.
Another video caught the last three and a half minutes of the game:
Here are the time stamps on the video to take a look at on this video:
0:10 - Tommy Curtis hits a baseline jumper to put UCLA comfortably ahead 70 - 59 with 3:22 remaining in the game.
1:15 - John Shumate gets the ball in the post and makes a nice move to get around Walton, then evades Walton’s block attempt, and scores to pull the Fighting Irish within 9 at 70 - 61.
Keep watching as Shumate steals the ball in the back court and drives for a layup. Suddenly Notre Dame is down by just 7 with just under 3 minutes to play.
2:00 - UCLA has gone into a semi-stall on offense, but Adrian Dantly steals a pass and drives in for a layup. Notre Dame is down by just 5 with 2 minutes to play.
Dick Enberg declares, “70 - 65, pandemonium now!”
Continue watching on the ensuing play as UCLA’s Tommy Curtis is the recipient of a three-quarter court pass. Curtis sprinted up court as UCLA took possession under their own basket. He looked like a wide receiver racing behind the secondary. Curtis lays in an uncontested basket to put UCLA back up by 7 with approx. 2:20 to play.
WAIT! Curtis is called for traveling! Take the points off the scoreboard.
It’s an enormous break for the Fighting Irish.
On the next play, Notre Dame goes to their leading scorer, Brokaw and he delivers a mid-range jumper to pull the Irish to within just 3 points with 2 minutes to go.
3:45 - UCLA’s Dave Meyers misses a short driving shot and Shumate grabs the rebound with 1:20 to play in the game. UCLA is still in front 70 - 67. Brokaw then nails another jumper from the top of the key and it’s 70 - 69 with just about 1 minute to go.
Color analyst Hot Rod Hundley yells, “look at this roaring crowd go crazy.”
4:15 - With less than 50 seconds to play Keith Wilkes gets the ball on the right side, makes a nifty move and lays it in. UCLA is back up in front by 3.
BUT WAIT! Wilkes is called for an offensive foul. No basket.
5:00 - Notre Dame works the ball to seldom used Dwight Clay in the right corner. He puts up a 20 footer from the baseline and hits it. It’s the only shot Clay has taken in the 2nd half.
Notre Dame has taken the lead 71 - 70 on 12 straight points.
Time out is called by UCLA with 30 seconds to go in the game.
But the timeout does little good. UCLA has a poor offensive set. However they get one more chance when Notre Dame loses the ball out of bounds under the UCLA basket.
6:40 - With 7 seconds to play UCLA is inbounding the ball under their basket. The ball is passed in to Walton. He immediately puts up a short jumper but it misses. The rebound is tapped around, Shumate grabs it, and the ball game is over.
Notre Dame has stopped UCLA’s 88 game winning streak and Bill Walton’s 139 game personal winning streak in stunning fashion by shutting out the Bruins over the final three and a half minutes 12 - 0 to escape with a 71 - 70 victory.
The fans mob the court. It’s a wild scene at Notre Dame.
Notre Dame fans are shouting, “God made Notre Dame #1.”
And so for 2nd time in 3 years, Notre Dame stopped a lengthy UCLA winning streak on this very same court.
After the game, John Shumate, who scored 24 points and grabbed the final key rebound at the end, told Forrest Miller in the South Bend Tribune, “This is the greatest feeling I’ve had in my life.”
Miller got a chance to talk to Dwight Clay about his long baseline jumper with 30 seconds to play was the game winner. Clay told him, “I didn’t have time to think about it. It feels really great. Unbelievable.”
Clay incredibly also sank game winners or overtime forcing buzzer beaters against Marquette, Ohio State and Pitt within the year prior to his big shot to beat UCLA.
Gary Brokaw of Notre Dame was the leading score in the game for both teams with 25 points. He told Miller, “I still can’t believe it. We made a lot of mistakes in the first half… At halftime coach (Digger Phelps) told us to play our own game in the second half and we did.”
It would seem, looking at the box score, that UCLA didn’t lose because of an injured or sub-par Bill Walton. Walton played all 40 minutes and was 12 for 14 from the field to lead the Bruins with 24 points and also grabbed a team high 9 rebounds. Yet UCLA coach John Wooden told the AP that Walton, who was playing with torn ligaments in his rib cage, “wasn’t as mobile as he was in the past. He was reluctant to take his hook shot and his injury hurt his board play.”
But Wooden was gracious and respectful in defeat. When asked by Joe Doyle, of the South Bend Tribune, if Notre Dame should now be the #1 team in the upcoming UPI Coaches Poll. “They’re going to get my vote,” said the Wizard of Westwood.
Wooden likely felt comfortable casting his vote for the Fighting Irish because he knew that in just one week UCLA would get a rare 2nd chance. Notre Dame and UCLA had agreed to play a home and home match this season and we’re just days away from seeing the 2 teams battle again. This time it will be on the campus of UCLA in Pauley Pavilion
The Sports Time Traveler™ will be there.
POSTSCRIPT
I waited around in 1974 for the past few days to see the outcomes of the AP and UPI polls. Would Notre Dame really get the #1 spot? After all, UCLA had been dominant in the polls all season.
In the week prior to the Notre Dame game, UCLA took all 46 1st place votes in the AP poll and all 34 votes in the UPI poll.
Would a single 1 point loss, in a game that UCLA led by 11 with 3:32 to go, really cost them the top spot?
On Monday of this week in 1974, the AP poll was released and Notre Dame took the top spot with 36 votes to 15 for UCLA.
The next day the UPI coaches poll came out. 21 coaches voted for Notre Dame and 14 for UCLA.
So it was official. Notre Dame was #1 in basketball. And 3 weeks earlier they had finished #1 in football.
For the first time in American men’s college sports history, a single school held the top spots in the rankings in both football and basketball.
Thanks. That was great. Especially the call letters for channel 5. Enberg was a great announcer