Wednesday spotlight: RIP Lorenzo Charles
- Lorenzo Charles, the former NC State and Atlanta Hawks basketball player who is most famous for putting back a missed shot to win the 1983 NCAA Title game died Monday when the bus he was driving crashed. No one else was on the bus.
- Along with the 1974 championship game where David Thompson (If you never look a link, please look at this one. Thompson was 6'4." Bill Walton, the UCLA player, was essentially 7'0." Look where their hands are!) helped NC State end UCLA's run of 7 consecutive national titles, Charles' putback ranks among the all-time great moments in NCAA basketball history for a school largely devoid of such moments.
- The 1983 game featured one of the greatest mismatches, on paper, in NCAA Title game history as the vaunted Houston Cougars, featuring future Hall of Famers Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler were massive favorites over the Wolfpack. But just like the earlier Wolfpack team, NC State prevailed and took down the title after Charles corralled a wild, last second shot and put it through the hoop to give his team a 54-52 win. Afterwards, NC State coach Jim Valvano famously ran around the court looking for somebody to hug.
- Olajuwon, Drexler and the city of Houston would recover though, as the two players managed to reunite with the NBA's Houston Rockets and win back-to-back NBA Championships in 1994 and 1995.
- Charles will forever be missed by the sporting world and it was perhaps put best by a friend of mine who said, "Somewhere in heaven, Jimmy V is waiting to give him a hug."
Metta World Baller?
- Los Angeles Lakers Forward Ron Artest has been making headlines for much of the past decade, usually for all the wrong reasons. Due in part to an infamous brawl in 2004 while playing for the Indiana Pacers (in which he actually entered the seats to fight with a fan) Artest started seeing a psychiatrist. After the Lakers won the 2010 NBA Championship Artest famously thanked his shrink during an on court interview. And that's nothing compared to his story about a table leg...
- Artest announced last week that he was officially going to change his name to “Metta World Peace.” The actions of Prince (or the artist formally known as Prince) and Chad Ochocinco may have been models for this bizarre name change stunt.
- Reports have also surfaced that he will play in Finland over the summer, leaving people wondering if one of the most bizarre and colorful athletes since Dennis Rodman will “Finnish” (sorry, couldn't resist) his career somewhere other than the NBA. As of Tuesday night, his agent had denied that this would take place but Artest himself had not confirmed nor denied the rumor.
South Carolina wins second straight College World Series
- This was the first season that the finale was played at TD Ameritrade Park as opposed to the longstanding home of the College World Series, Rosenblatt Stadium.
- While the location was different, the winner was the same as the Gamecocks beat the Florida Gators 5-2 to win the title in a game that was not as close as many of the nailbiters that preceded it for South Carolina.
- Winning pitcher Michael Roth summed up the Gamecocks' mindset by saying "We go out and stick together as a team. We battle. I can’t describe it. We’re a bunch of Average Joes and love each other and come out and battle.”
- The Gamecocks went undefeated this year and their streaks of 16 NCAA tournament wins and 11 straight in the CWS are both the longest of all-time.
