Tony’s Take | 40th Sweaterversary | UGA Statement | Point Shaving

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By Tony Duckworth, [email protected]

40th Sweaterversary. THE SWEATER GAME took place on February 27, 1985. For those who have no idea about this game, let me take you back to a glorious time in college basketball.

Big East basketball was powerful with #1 St. John’s, #2 Georgetown, and #15 Syracuse. The 1985 Big East is compared to the current version of the SEC which some claim is the best league in CBB history. Other ’85 teams would have been represented in the TOP 25, but they beat up each other throughout conference play to keep that from happening. Six of the nine teams made the NCAA tournament. Villanova met fellow conference foe Georgetown in the NCAA championship game and Cinderella was crowned.

Back to the sweaterversary. Colorful personalities littered the schools in the Big East during this time. Lou “Looie” Carnesecca was known for game-day sideline sweaters. Looie was best known for the hideous brown “lucky” sweater he donned during a 19-game winning streak that catapulted St. John’s to the top of CBB in 1985. Looie was maybe 5’8″ with the right shoes, while his counterpart John “Big John” Thompson stood 6’10”.

The stage was set for #1 vs #2 in Madison Square Garden. As Georgetown’s Thompson approached St. John’s Carnesecca for the ceremonial pre-game handshake, Big John opened his jacket to Looie and then turned to the crowd to show off that he was wearing a replica “lucky” sweater. As you can imagine, Looie broke out in laughter and the crowd went crazy. Thompson told the story in an interview that he sent a former Hoyas player to the St. John’s bookstore to purchase the replica sweater for this nationally televised game.

Georgetown beat St John’s in the sweater game 85 – 69. The Hoyas went on to defeat St. John’s in the Big East tournament and in the Final 4 that season. The only loss Georgetown had during this stretch was the national championship against Villanova.

Another part of the gamesmanship between Looie…

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Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/article/tonys-40th-sweaterversary-uga-statement-220700554.html

Author : The Albany Herald, Ga.

Publish date : 2025-03-04 22:07:00

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