Well, here’s something you don’t see every day. Or every year. Or any year, not since 1992: The UCLA and USC men’s and women’s basketball teams all playing in their respective NCAA tournaments at the same time.
I could tell you that the last time it happened, Sharon Stone’s “Basic Instinct” and Vanessa Williams’ “Save the Best for Last” were chart-topping hits. Remind you that President George H. W. Bush was in office.
Or I could just tell you who was suiting up. These were Lisa Leslie’s and Harold Miner’s women and men of Troy, Don MacLean’s and Natalie Williams’ Bruins.
Those are some of the most impactful players in those proud programs’ histories – teams whose fates, somehow, haven’t coalesced concurrently since then, until now.
The UCLA men, seeded second in the West Region, face No. 15 UNC Asheville in first-round action Thursday night; the fourth-seeded UCLA women host their first-round game against No. 13 Sacramento State on Saturday night at Pauley Pavilion.
The USC women have a first-round game in Blacksburg, Virginia, against ninth-seeded South Dakota State on Friday, the same day that the 10th-seeded Trojan men face No. 7 Michigan State in the opening round in Columbus.
It’s been 31 years since L.A. college basketball had such a March moment, difficult as that is to believe. “Really?” MacLean asked. “I’m surprised by that.”
Well, OK. Let’s see. The USC women – twice national champions in the 1980s – are emerging from a nine-year NCAA tournament drought, so go back to 2014, when … only the UCLA men were participating in our national springtime sports delirium.
And in 2011, when the USC and UCLA men and UCLA women all went dancing – the Trojan women finished 18-12, a couple of victories shy of the 20 that likely would have punched their ticket.
Then it was the USC men who were left without a seed in the field when the music stopped in 2006, and before that, the UCLA women left out in 1997.
But 1992? Well, 1992 was mad fun.
That year, Jim Harrick’s UCLA men were in revival mode, ranked among the nation’s top teams all season and building toward their deepest tournament run in a dozen years.
Coached by George Raveling, the USC men started the year unranked and finished No. 8 in the final Associated Press poll, which should tell you what Miner – aka “Baby Jordan,” as they called the 1992 Sports Illustrated Player of the Year – and his crew of workers proved that season.
Remember Harold Miner aka “Baby Jordan”?
He was a human highlight machine at USC and was named Sports Illustrated College Player Of The Year over Shaq, Zo & Laettner after his junior year. pic.twitter.com/gLXdV1t8r8
— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) March 6, 2019
The USC women had as few as eight players available at some points, but they too were resuscitating their program under coach Marianne Stanley. They got to the Elite Eight, where they lost to Stanford, the eventual champion. (You had to go through Leslie, the future WNBA star and four-time Olympic gold medalist, if you were going to win a title those days: USC lost to eventual champion Texas Tech in the Sweet 16 in 1993 and then get ousted by national runner-up Louisiana Tech in the Elite Eight the season after.)
And the UCLA women were not only winning but showcasing the multi-dimensional talents of Williams, probably the best two-sport athlete in Bruins history. They even had her play a basketball exhibition and a volleyball match on the same day in 1992: “‘This will be a good media opportunity,” Williams recalled athletic department officials telling her in a 2016 ESPN interview. “And we know you can do it.’”
The can-do spirit was strong with the local basketball programs, and L.A. was excited about it.
“Put it this way, I never played in a game at Pauley Pavilion that wasn’t sold out,” said MacLean, who in 1992 became the Pac-10 (now Pac-12’s) all-time leading scorer, with 2,608 points. “Not one.”
The Bruins lost just twice at home that year, once to top-ranked Duke and to the Trojans – who also beat them at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, which was razed in 2016. That place presented a serious home-court advantage too, resulting in just one home loss for USC. Point guard Duane Cooper remembers: “We could hear teams we were playing going, ‘Man, I hate this place! It’s so cold in here.’ And we knew: ‘They have no shot tonight.’”
The USC women played at the Sports Arena too – sometimes. They also played at the Lyon Center, the recreation center on campus, remembers Jualeah Woods, a sophomore forward in 1992.
“For women, it’s evolved so much,” said Woods, now a coach at the University of San Diego. “They’re playing at the Galen Center, and now they have training table and all these support systems. We had a great deal of support, but it was just different.”
The men’s game changed too, of course. Three-point shooting became paramount, which might not have broken basketball, but certainly has altered it, said Cooper – who, as a senior in ’92, was a 42.6% 3-point shooter on nearly five attempts per game.
Really good for a guy who didn’t play with a 3-point line at Lakewood High, where he now coaches. Still, even with such a deft outside touch, he preferred the physical nature of the game when he played it: “I’m good where I was.”
All four of L.A.’s teams were good enough to advance in 1992, when Cooper’s Trojans lost first, in the second round, on the wrong end of one of those memorable March miracles.
After Rodney Chatman’s 6-foot jumper with 3.4 seconds left gave the second-seeded Trojans (24-6) a two-point lead over Georgia Tech, Yellow Jackets freshman James Forrest flung his only 3-point attempt of the season toward the basket with eight-tenths of a second remaining.
It fell, and so did USC, 79-78, in Milwaukee.
Coach Billie Moore’s fifth-seeded UCLA women (21-10) lost in the Sweet Sixteen to eighth-seeded Southwest Missouri State, 83-57. And, in the Elite Eight, the USC women (23-8) were upended, 82-62, by the Cardinal, the Pac-10’s burgeoning power that would win its second title in three seasons.
The UCLA men (28-5) also lost in the Elite Eight, routed 106-79 by Indiana – who the Bruins had beaten, 87-72, to start both teams’ seasons.
“It was a disappointment that we didn’t get to the Final Four,” said MacLean, who went on to play almost a decade in the NBA and now provides on-air hoops analysis on radio and TV. “But look, if you’re disappointed getting to an Elite Eight, it shows how good of a season you had.”
How good a season are the current Bruins and Trojans having? How much better could they get?
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MacLean thinks UCLA’s experience and defensive intensity could help overcome the loss of injured defensive whiz Jaylen Clark. Similarly, Woods believes the Trojan women’s defensive bite could help them win the battles of will ahead.
The UCLA women don’t have a phenom like Williams on the roster, but, if things go according to plan Saturday, they’ll have a couple of home games – and the talent to take advantage of it, keyed by three-time All-Pac-12 selection Charisma Osborne.
And the USC men, the lowest-seeded of the quartet? On his bracket, Cooper has them penciled in for the Final Four. Why not? He knows first-hand what twists the tournament is capable of turning – and also what it means to have participated, whether you’re left heartbroken or exultant.
“The way we lost wasn’t great,” chuckled Cooper, who was drafted by the Lakers and played in the NBA and abroad. “But it’s a great time of your life. A great accomplishment for your team.”
It’s true. That these four programs have arrived at the dance together so rarely proves it.
The best thing they can do now, as Woods’ mom, Doris, would advise her when they’d talk on the phone before these big games: “Baby, go out and play hard.”
#TBT to the all-time leading scorer in #UCLA and @pac12 hoops history, Don MacLean (2,608 points). pic.twitter.com/g0movQoLNq
— UCLA Men’s Basketball (@UCLAMBB) May 29, 2014
From Troy to Springfield: Congrats to @USC_Athletics‘ Lisa Leslie, the newest member of the @hoophall! #FightOn pic.twitter.com/rBMJo7ozdC
— Pac-12 Network (@Pac12Network) April 6, 2015
Last night, UCLA Athletics Hall of Famer Natalie Williams was inducted into the Pac-12 Hall of Honor!
At UCLA, Williams became the first-ever woman to earn first-team All-America honors in both volleyball and basketball in the same year!
Congrats, @NatWillBBall! #GoBruins pic.twitter.com/urDYLO5ulR
— UCLA W. Basketball (@UCLAWBB) March 4, 2023