They called it the Super Bowl of college basketball. Good evening everyone. We are getting set here for what promises to be one tremendous championship game for the national intercolgate basketball title. The year is 1979 and two mountains of the sport from very different places are colliding in Salt Lake City, Utah for the world to see.
United senior from French Lake, Indiana, Larry Bird. And from Michigan State, wearing number 33 at guard 6.8 sophomore from Lancing, Michigan, Urban Magic Johnson. It will be the most watched college game of all time and it will change the sport forever. When Larry Bird played against Ed Johnson, you would have thought that there couldn’t be two people less alike in the world.
I mean, let’s face it, if if Larry Bird were black and and came from Chicago, it wouldn’t have been as big a deal. They they were they were polar opposites, one black, one white, one outgoing, one shy. That was the charm of the attraction. I did not like Larry Bird. He didn’t like me because we were both born after the same thing.
Magic was just mindboggling to me the way he get the ball off the board and dribble it up and make the play and seemed like he had his hand in everything. I wanted to be the best and he wanted to be the best. When you win 33 in a row and you walk into a game, you know, you never know what to expect, but I expect to win. So it’s like two old gun sleeers saying meet me out front and you know only one could survive.
To set the stage for the greatest college basketball game ever, we first have to understand the origins of its two rivals. A story of two completely different worlds colliding on the biggest stage the game has ever seen. It was a story of polar opposites. And for us, it begins in Lancing, Michigan. In August of 1959, Irvin Johnson was born. And the future of the game of basketball changed forever.
My father, he got up early every morning, 6:00 or so, and uh he went to work on his trash hauling truck every single day. Around noon, he would come home, catch a nap, and then he worked for General Motors for 30 years, and he won an award for never being late and never uh missed a day. My brother’s fans went down to me and and and so on.
As you look back, it kind of hurt it because you didn’t you couldn’t dress the way the other kids dress. But like I said, as a as a big family, you learn how to to appreciate what you have. As a kid, young Irvin showed signs of his first love, basketball. When he was about six, he used to roll up socks and go around the house and pretend it was a basketball.
He would use the clothes basket and he would shoot these socks. Playing 101 with the socks. He would be Will Chamberlain. I would be W Frasier. So, I just had to do what I had to do. Take him to school. Yeah. His dad brought him his first basketball. That was the highlight of his life. If you could see the smile on his face, you would thought it was Christmas.
I was out there all day long before we went to school. The bus leave at 7 7:30. I was out there at 6:00 6:30 working on my game. My mother sometime had to bring me food or she would have one of my brothers and sisters go get that boy so he can eat something. I love the game so much that I would go out there and just play all day and night.
Whether I was carrying groceries, whether I was doing some running errand for my mom or dad, I was always had one hand free to dribble that basketball. It didn’t matter when it what time of the day it was. Uh he could be going to school to catch the bus, he would dribble the basketball. The neighbors would have to tell him, “Herman, cut it out.” Early in the morning, we were ball dribbling going down the street and uh the neighbors used to get so mad at him.
He held it to the store downtown back uh just around the block. That’s shows you interest right there that hey, this is what he going to do. From a very young age, Irvin knew what he wanted to do. He had it all planned out. My dreams were to play in the NBA and become a businessman with a little guy. He had uh the good fundamentals of basketball and probably he’s going to be a pretty good basketball player. We didn’t think it could come that quick.
You know, he not only wanted to play the game, but he wanted to change the game. His legend grew from playing on the playgrounds cuz everybody would see this kid and come out, man, he could play. And then they tell somebody else and then it just got all over town and they start looking for him and asking for him. Let’s play. Let’s play. In 1974, Irvin would take his playground game to the hardwood, suiting up for Everett High School in Lancing. When he came to Everett, he was announced.
People said, “Oh, wait until Urban Johnson comes. Wait until Urban Johnson comes.” I told all my friends that I had a kid coming in here that would make them forget about every other basketball player in the area or maybe they ever saw. And everybody kind of teased me about that, but we knew we had something special. From the jump, it was clear Irvin was the area’s best, and soon he’d prove it.
We walked in that first game, I’d never seen that damn pack before. I had butterflies in my stomach. I can’t even describe it. But, uh, when you come up through that door and you can smell that aroma of the popcorn and you hear the bath d, you know, and you just, oh man, you just like you a Superman. Like you’re a Superman. And you just bust through the thing and you go into our trot.
It’s over. It’s over. Got Johnson on the right wing. Beard goes all the way up. Off by Beard to Johnson. Johnson coming all the way. He would always include everybody. He wanted to win. That meant if he had to score 50, he would. But if he had to score 20 and get everybody else involved, that’s the greatness I that I appreciated about Irvin.
I just love playing, getting out there and, you know, hoping I see win. If I’m playing pickup ball, whenever I just want to win, no matter where we’d go, he’d have TV cameras there, news people would re cuz they knew he we had a a phenomenal planet. Word would quickly spread about Everett High’s basketball wizard. And before long, everyone knew Irvin Johnson by one simple word.
I covered the game for the Lancing State Journal. And I congratulated him on the game. And then I said, “Vranvin, we got to name you something.” And uh I said, “The Big E is out because of Elvin Hayes and Dr. Jay was out because of Julius Irving. How about magic?” And he says, “Well, that’s okay with me, Mr. Stablin.” So the next day in the paper back home, Urban Magic Johnson.
In the beginning, I thought it was foolish and dumb. You know, I didn’t know nothing about a nickname. Then what happened was you start saying, “Wait a minute, it fits my game.” Hanging out with my boys on the street corners, we used to sing Temptation song. They started saying, “Hey man, imagine that’s cool.” And then people on the street start saying, “Hey, Magic.
” And I said, “He bought into it.” And um I think he felt he had to kind of live up to that name. And I must say that he did. People expect so much from him because of that name. Before long, Magic’s fame had spread across the state and eventually the country. He was more than a basketball player. He was a phenomenon. This place was just going crazy.
And at that point, I really knew that there was something magical about Irving. Even if you didn’t go to Evere who he was all the girls would say, well, you know, can you tell your brother to call? I’m like, no, I can’t tell my brother to call you. You know, there were just things like that, you know, or you can even get me some tickets, you know. No, I can barely get my own tickets.
He had this huge afro and it had to his afro had to be in place. He loved it. More attention he got, you know, he just he wanted attention from anybody he could get it from. Get it over and back and he jams it through. Urban Johnson. Irvin loved to dress. Nice sander belt pants and over coats with the the fur around the collar. Irvin was the first guy to have a posi.
He not only had a posi of a lot of black kids, he had a lot of white kids and hanging around him. In his senior year, Magic would average 29 points, leading Everett to their first ever state championship. For this team, Everett High School, who really didn’t have a history of basketball to win the state title, you know, it was just like, who’s ever? And all of a sudden, here they are and they couldn’t be stopped.
You shoot well, you pass well, you dribble, score, assist. We’re trying to figure out what you do best. Do you know? We can’t figure it out. No, just try to help and contribute to the team. That’s what I do best. You know, Johnson had proven to be the game’s next bright star. And as the buzz continued to grow, so did the attention from college scouts.
However, for Iran, it wouldn’t be a hard decision. He had felt the love in East Lancing and he didn’t plan on going anywhere else. Is there any questions before I get started? No. Um, next year I will be uh attending Michigan State University. Every hero needs arrival. And Magix’s had begun his own story 359 miles south.
Larry Joe Bird was born in West Ben, Indiana, but everyone knows him as the hick from French Lake. Rural Indiana was simple. a quiet slice of America filled with hardworking people who did what they needed to to get by.
But just like the humble work ethic that gets passed down from one generation to the next, there’s another natural gene that’s passed down in Indiana. Basketball. It’s what forms community in Indiana. It’s a cultured basketball. It’s rural. It’s doing nothing all day long but shooting jump shots so that they are great pure shooters. I remember Larry telling me how he had waxed the net because the net would last longer that way.
Everybody in my my town had the same things. It seemed like uh nothing. So all we did was play sports. Larry’s mother did what she could to provide, working long hours in a local diner. and his father worked construction but was unable to keep a job for long due to a longstanding struggle with alcohol. He loved his father. His father had was a flawed man. His father was an alcoholic.
His father was a laborer who had skills that were uh that he he could only bring to bear when he was sober enough to work. I didn’t know that people made millions of dollars. I didn’t know that everybody had a family car. I was in my own cocoon. I was in a small town with the people I knew and I thought I’d live there for the rest of my life. He grew up in one of the most simplistic ways imaginable.
Uh his family didn’t have a phone till he was a teenager. The birds routinely moved to different rented house to different rented house, none of which were ever big enough to accommodate everybody. Really the essence of Larry to me is his mother who would get up at 3:30 in the morning and go work at a diner in the morning and then come back as the kids were getting ready for school, get them off to school and then trudge off to her next job because they didn’t have a car. I think it’s as you mature, you start to to respect all that. As growing up,
you don’t realize that you don’t have anything because you never had it in the first place. But uh you know making some money and looking back I remember all of it and I don’t want to be like that again. Bird’s saving grace would come on the cracked concrete courts behind the town’s high school gym. All he had was an old leather ball and rusty rims.
But this is where Larry fell in love with the game of basketball. Away from the struggles at home, Bird chased perfection on the empty court, trading the struggle of life for the rhythm of a jump shot. We didn’t have a lot when we grew up and uh basketball when it came into my life, that’s all I did. By the time Larry enrolled at Springs Valley High School, Bird had followed the steps of his brothers, staying true to his Indiana roots by trying out for the basketball team.
You know, at school, everybody tell me my my bigger brother was a great player and they can’t wait to grow up and and try to be like him. And you can see he was proud of of how he he played on a certain night and and I sort of won the same feeling. He was just an average basketball player at that time. Uh but there used to be a basketball court halfway up the hill and you would always I I can remember seeing him down there shooting at that basketball in the rain, you know, out there shooting a basketball in the rain and just practicing by himself. I had a couple friends I played with a lot,
but I was picking up on things that I I thought that that were um relative simple moves that they had a hard time with. And that’s when things started clicking a little bit for me. Although his freshman season would be spent on the bench, during his sophomore year, Bird would learn a life lesson that would inspire one of the greatest work ethics the game has ever seen.
Following the ankle injury his sophomore year, Larry would be forced to miss a large portion of the season. However, one day, Bird recalls his father coming home from work and needing help taking off his work boot. underneath was a black and blue ankle that looked severe. We don’t know if he broke it or he just heard it, but had a lot of swelling in his ankle and couldn’t get his boot on.
We had to help him get his boot on, go to work. So, you know, to me it been very easy to just say heck with it, but he knew he had to go. So, he we helped him get it on there and he went to work. This lesson taught a young Larry what it meant to work through any circumstance. And immediately Bird was out shooting in his driveway on his crutches.
Well, my confidence came from me shooting basketball by myself for hours upon hours. I mean, it’s not I didn’t pick up a ball on a Saturday and decide I was going to score 40 a game. I mean, that that preparation came way before that. So, I played a lot of basketball in my life and did a lot of shooting from every angle, from every position. U then once I grew, you know, be 69, the game become a lot easier.
It was just like I don’t know magic wand and touched him or or miracle had happened because uh we never seen him play like that. I was playing one time and they was growing up standing around and I was playing really well and they were really excited about it and once I seen the impact I was making just with a few people standing there I started playing more and more and started develop my skills and and really take my game to another level.
Citing the hours of work he had put in his preparation, Larry would average over 30 points and nearly 20 rebounds his senior year with word quickly spreading about this kid from French Lake. Still, most colleges didn’t know what to make of Larry. He was tall but thin with slow feet. And being from the middle of nowhere, many schools had never even heard of him. Enter the legendary Bob Knight, head coach of the Indiana Hooers.
It was every Indiana kid’s dream to wear the red and white, and Larry was no different, signing to play at Indiana in the fall of 1974. The next two years would be the most successful in the storied program’s history, as the Hooers would lose only one game and capture a national championship. Only one thing was missing. Larry Bird. Just 24 days after enrolling in Bloomington, Larry had already packed his bags and hitchhiked home to French Lake. Coming from a town that had around 2,000.
Then going somewhere where they had over 30,000, right away I sensed that I I was in the wrong environment. And you know, you can just see the two closets in this little dormatory room and the one kid’s got this rack of fine nice clothes and Larry Bird’s got nothing but a couple of pairs of jeans. I think that the size of the school and not really having, you know, that many friends there and uh not having a lot or coming from a lot, I think he just got a little discouraged and a little depressed and bailed out without really consulting anyone. I don’t think he was really ready to go to school. And I wasn’t
as attuned to what his needs uh were as a kid as I should have been. We passed Coach Knight going to a bookstore at IU and Larry acknowledged, you know, so I I said, “Hi, Coach Knight.” And he just kept walking and it really hurt Larry’s feelings. Plus, I didn’t have the funds and the clothing and and things I I thought I needed to to get me through.
I made my mind up that I couldn’t survive there and it was time to go. Upon returning home, Larry would begin working for the city, collecting garbage, mowing lawns, and disappearing from the basketball radar. You know, some days we picked up trash once a week. The next days we might be um cleaning the streets. And the guys I was working with were great guys.
I I’m I knew them all my life, and I’m I’m still grateful that they gave me the job. Just months later, an 18-year-old bird would experience rock bottom when his father tragically took his own life. His father cared very much for his family. Certainly, there was talk in town that he had trouble taking home that paycheck and he would often stop at the bar and not quite make it home. And he killed himself.
Larry believes, and I think most of the family believes, so the family could have the insurance money. They had a lot of financial problems. And I think Larry’s dad at that point thought they were better off without him than with him. Larry’s hard to figure out cuz he doesn’t really show emotions. I’m sure he had a lot of pain. He just holds it inside. It definitely was a tough year. There’s no question about that.
But the one thing that I did was uh make a decision where I was going to make my own decisions from that point on. And if there was good decisions, that’s great. If there’s bad decisions, I had to live with them. There’s nothing you do about something like that. I mean, he he chose the way he wanted to die and he did it.
And uh it’s just unfortunately that some people have problems like that, but you know, I I wish he was here, but he’s not. So, I had to go on with my life and try to make the most of my life. Once again, basketball served as an escape for Larry. He never stopped playing, even suiting up with Hancock Construction Company in local adult league tournaments in the area. Most days you could find him behind the French Lick Springs Resort shooting hoops with the kitchen staff until one day someone was watching.
His mother ran me off the first time I knocked on the door. She didn’t said that Larry had seen all the coaches that he wanted to see and he wasn’t going back to school and she just wish people quit bothering him. Hidden in the bushes near the court was Bill Hodes, a college assistant coach from Armstrong State in Georgia. An Indiana native, Hodes had driven across the country in a beat up Dodge Dart, desperate for a shot at a coaching breakthrough. He was down on his luck, out of big opportunities, and running out of time.
In a lastditch effort to change his life, Hodes had reached out to then Indiana State coach Bob King with an idea. Signing Larry Bird. If Bill Hodes hadn’t been as persistent as he had been, Larry Bird might never have existed in any of our minds. I believe that with all my heart. I really do. I’ve already been through 50 or 60 recruiters and I’ve heard all the BS that they throw.
So, uh, Coach Hodge was he was so persistent. You know, he always tried to get to the family and one member of the family tell him get lost. He go to the next member. But I told him, I said, I’ll let you know when if I want to go to any state, I’ll call you.
And uh I got tired of seeing the guy and and then finally we sat down and talked about it and and I just decided on Indiana State. He had a friend named Kevin KS that uh Larry was telling me how Kevin would have been a great player if he’d have gone to college, you know, and he hadn’t gone and he was married and he was really good. And I said, “Well, if you don’t go to college, they’re going to be saying that about you someday, that you would have been great gift.
” One year after leaving Indiana University, Larry Bird would sign to play at Indiana State. This was Larry’s second chance, and this time there was no turning back. While Larry was finding his wings in Indiana, back in East Lancing, Magic was preparing to take on a new challenge. Leading the hometown Michigan State Spartans to college basketball’s ultimate prize.
Coach Jud Heathcoat had convinced the 68 star to stay in Michigan. And he had done so by promising that despite his size, he would trust Johnson to run the point guard spot for the Spartans. And it was just a matter of convincing him that he was not going to play center here. He was not going to play forward. He was going to play Urban Johnson style of basketball.
He wanted to be a guard from day one. Even though he was 6’8. His first game, he scored seven points and had seven turnovers. And there were people that said, “Well, Jud is ruining Magic Johnson, playing him out of position.” Seeing them run out, that’s what I always wanted to do. run out in the green and white and I finally got my chance to do that and play in front of my family.
Oh man, it was almost the first time I felt like crying. He had an unbelievable basketball IQ. He was the the leader. He was a take charge guy from the day he walked on the court. It wouldn’t take long for Magic to adjust to his new position as the floor general, and before long, Michigan State would begin making noise across the nation.
That’s what I remember about Michigan State. The fact that we got a chance to change college basketball in a sense and we did it with style play. It was Urban’s job to distribute the ball and he has done that. He’s been a magician at that. That’s why they call him the magic man. He sees the open man.
He knows when to get the ball to the right person at the right time at the right place. I’ve always led and I don’t know anything else but being a leader. I don’t know how to follow. Irvin’s the type of player that could hit you when you were open and often times he knew you were open before you knew you were. So I got used to playing with him and always watching for the ball because it might come out of out of nowhere.
Michigan State hadn’t had a winning team like that in a long time. I mean, it was the tension on campus. It was just like, you know, uh, about to boil over. By the end of his historic first season in East Lancing, Magic would have the Spartans in the thick of the championship hunt, leading them all the way to the Elite 8 before falling to the eventual champion Kentucky Wildcats.
And down court in a hurry comes Irvin Johnson. Long shot at the buzzer. No good. Put back up. No good. Kentucky has lost the NCAA regional. Well, the Irvin Johnson Magic show is closed for the season. With the loss, the NBA would come calling, but Magic and the Spartans had unfinished business to attend. In 1979, everyone just assumed that Iran would turn professional.
Urban did not want to turn professional. We had came so close my first year and so I said I’m going back because I didn’t accomplish what I came here to accomplish. Magic would be returning for another run at a championship. But back in Indiana, a young Larry Bird would begin to make his own name in the college basketball world. I want to thank my guys over at Novig for sponsoring this video.
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They’re also offering you a 100% purchase match up to $25. As always, practice responsible gameplay. Thanks again to Novig for sponsoring this video. When Larry Bird arrived in Teroot, the Indiana State Sycamores were an afterthought on the national stage. No NCAA tournament appearances, no all-ameans, just a struggling program in need of identity. Teroot is like a a small town. It’s not a small town.
It’s got 100,000 people or so, but people treat you like it’s a small town. Everybody knows you. Uh, and I think Larry felt like it was kind of an extension of French Lick. Being forced to sit out a year due to NCAA rules, Larry wasn’t able to suit up his first year on campus. But it wouldn’t take him long to show the coaching staff that he was ready to change the program.
He could practice and our first five couldn’t beat him. Coach King said, “Larry, I’ve got to do something to let the first five win once in a while. They can’t win as long as you’re in there.” And you know, Larry kind of smirked and he said, “Well, just let them take their beating like a man.
” In his very first season on the floor, the team saw a dramatic shift. Bird would average 32.8 points per game in his first collegiate season, doing it with a brand of basketball few had ever seen. He is knocked out of his hands by King, picked up by Bird. Threeon-one Smith in the middle. Smith to Bird. He is there and he’s got it. Well, he he’s playing in a, you know, what’s not a power conference.
I use the big, you know, the big 10 or Larry’s conference kind of lesser. And he carried that with him, you know, I think throughout his life, you know, people doubting him and and and not respecting where he was from or or what he grew up with and uh he had to earn that and he did. That’s the key. Bird shot up. Good. Larry Bird with his 44th point. And what a show he has put on here.
Over time, the crowds in Terote grew. Local papers gave the sycamores front page headlines, and before long, Larry Bird would be attracting attention from across the country. To me, it was something very special because I went in there and they had like a 1313 season. All of a sudden, uh, you go from having two and 3,000 people at your games till people can’t get tickets.
Wherever hers gather, they no longer talk of weather. Indiana has a new state bird. Now his claim to fame is just the way he plays the game. Indiana has a new state. Can you tell us your name? Although I don’t think we need to ask. Brad Miley. Brad Miley. You’re not Brad Miley. Larry Bird. Larry Bird. It’s not the Cardinal now. Hey Larry, take a bow.
Indiana has a new state and you’re from French Lick, Indiana. You said it all when you said it. Yeah. From out of old French lick going up to he came to play some basketball. What position do you play with the team? Um well, you know, as you know, I had to do everything. So, I play all positions. Now, we don’t know a thing about what the future will bring, but for now, we’re going to spread the word.
The fighting sick boys are racking up the scores. And Indiana has a new state. Indiana has Larry always says the turning point for him was when Sports Illustrated put him on the cover and they had two cheerleaders around him saying, “Shh, the best kept secret in college basketball.” Well, not anymore. Once that came out on the stands, from that point on, it seemed like to me the next year was just total chaos.
We had reporters from all over the country and uh it seemed like every day somebody wanted me to do something for him. So, from that point on, it was very tough. People were coming down from everywhere, the network, CBS, NBC, uh uh ABC. Uh but he didn’t have a lot to say. Uh, not that he couldn’t say it, just that he was a little quiet, a little backward.
All of a sudden, you went from this quiet guy with his friends to to people looking over his shoulders, reporters following you around everywhere you went, u people taking pictures, and and it was something that I didn’t like, and it was tough to deal with. As the legend of the kid from Indiana had grown, so his attention from the National Basketball Association.
And in the 1978 draft, the historic Boston Celtics would select Larry Bird sixth overall. Still having a year left in his college eligibility, Larry would make a move that had never been done before or since, electing to remain in college for his final season. While the Celtics held his draft rights, I can remember somebody telling me I was just drafted by the Boston Celtics, and I was just saying, “What are you talking about?” I had absolutely no clue that they had a draft that day.
I said to Red B, I said, “Red, why would you draft this guy Bird and you know he’s not going to play for this season.” And he looked at me and he said, “Do you know how short a period of time a year is?” He wasn’t going to go with Boston. See, money at that time, uh, money was foreign to him. You know, he he made $6 an hour. That’s pretty darn good. It really wasn’t that tough because I wanted to get my education while I was there cuz I knew I would never go back.
You know, the one thing about athletes is they always say, “Well, I’ll go back next year and do it.” But they never do. Led by the return of their star, the Sycamores opened the 1978-79 season, 29-0. With Larry becoming a national icon in the process, whether it be his elite scoring or crafty court vision, Bird was in a league of his own. and he was leading Indiana State to one of the best seasons in college basketball history.
Every offense we ran, the first thing we wanted to happen was Larry to touch the ball and that was our goal was to get it in his hands. 75% of the time that we had it and boy, you get the ball in his hands, he did a tremendous job with it. Read the bird out of the right corner. Let’s go. Number 33, 6’9 in forward Larry Bird. Here they simply call him the bird. And seeing him play is called bird watching.
Ranked seventh among all-time leading college scorers. The bird averages 29 points a game. The bird in the left corner. Don’t warm up. And he rips off the 20footer. The way we were beating teams were just on pure guts and determination. So we just got in our minds that we wouldn’t get beat. If we was number two and a number one team got beat, we should be number one.
You know, if they’re going to go ahead and rank us up to number two, they should go ahead and give us number one if we win. you know, by Larry practicing and playing 100%, you know, he he demanded that you play 100%. He demanded that you take a charge or you dive after that ball because he would do the same thing. Larry, a quiet kid now firmly in the national spotlight, would win multiple individual awards in the process, including being named the Naymith College Basketball Player of the Year in 1979.
I mean, we’d watched them all year long coming along and we kind of thought, you know, well, as soon as they get to the tournament, then we’ll find out the real thing. And then somehow they just kept winning. Oh, it’s all over. There is Larry Bird being congratulated. Reed gets it to heal. Indiana State undefeated. They’re going to the final four game.
Larry, how good does it feel? They’re going to the final four. We’re here and we finally made it. Everything just fell into place. It was not only good for the the college, it was good for the community and it was good for the players. Everybody involved, it was just something that happens once in life. Indiana State has won it. The Sycamores are 33 and0. It’ll be that dream matchup.
Irvin Johnson of Michigan State, Larry Bird of Indiana State on Monday night. Irvin Magic Johnson, a player unlike anyone Bird had ever faced. It’s a dream come true and uh like I said, it’s awful important game and just hope we play our part and win the game. Magic couldn’t wait to give you the best smile and say, “How are you?” Make you feel good. Larry Bird would rather say, “Don’t don’t even say hi to me.
I’d rather not get involved with this.” I did not like Larry Bird. He didn’t like me. Not because, you know, something happened, but because we were both born after the same thing. They’ll always be linked, won’t they? And that’s that’s part of the beauty of sports from that 79 NCAA championship. It’s pretty hard to say Larry Bird without thinking of Magic Johnson.
We were never going to see a situation like that again because now we’re following kids from like fifth grade. But Larry and Magic, there was a buildup that a lot of people didn’t see. You know, Indiana State, a lot of people didn’t know the whole story. This whisper starts growing into like a roar of, hey, this kid, look at look at what Indiana State is doing.
And the anticipation builds in a way that you can’t get anymore. It was David Goliath. flashy versus kind of workmanlike. I think uh just the timing of it and the undefeated nature of Indiana State and how they going to do against the big boys from the Big 10. You know, the TV ratings back then, people just had four or five channels to pick from. Now they got 400. But in my case, people really didn’t see me play on national TV.
I was from a mid- major uh school. We were undefeated and we’re playing against a Big 10 champion. And u I think it just caught everybody’s attention. They called it the Super Bowl of College Hoops. On March 26th, 1979, more than 35 million people tuned in to watch Indiana State verse Michigan State, a number that is still an all-time record to this day. We actually had two men on Larry everywhere he went.
There he is, Dick. Look at they have sandwiched in completely. I’m surprised they didn’t play a box on one. You know, four guys on Larry and one on the other four. Um because that’s they didn’t have a lot of talent. You know, if you stop Larry, you pretty much stopped them. Look at the pressure around him. Two, three, and he’s short. I didn’t play well at all.
Biggest game of my life. I didn’t play well. Way short. I think our our length and our size, our jumping ability was able to bother him. her hand and score. I didn’t shoot well. Missed uh I think three free throws. Larry Bird has had a cold shooting night. Magic had a tremendous advantage of guards of that era and even guards of today is that he could see the whole court.
He could see over people because of his height and then his great ability to handle the ball and pass. uh he could just do more things because he was a 68 point guard. Magic was just mindboggling. I mean the way he get the ball off the board and dribble it up and make the play and seemed like he had his hand in everything.
Like a shot reload in the pass and all over Michigan State University National Champions 1979. Patrick, not only were you leader on offense, I thought you did a great job on Larry Bird in the zone tonight in the ball. Yes. Uh coach uh gave us a good game plan to go against Larry Bird and all we had to do is go out and do it. That’s what we done. Congratulations. Super Bowl game.
It was over. You know, that was my four years. It was done. It still hurts. And when you win 33 in a row and you walk into a game, you know, you never know what to expect. But I expect to win. We didn’t win. Toughest loss I ever took. I knew it was going to haunt him forever cuz we were going to see each other a lot.
While Magic Johnson had stayed true to his word and brought an NCAA championship home to Michigan State, the real story wasn’t the final score. It was the arrival of a new chapter. The night would not only cement Magic and Bird as national stars, but would spark a rivalry that was about to carry basketball into a new golden era.
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