A Big Hand For The Cards

Not when Vandeweghe, he of the sword-swift first step, drove for dunks three times and made two other inside baskets on the way to 16 first-half points. Not when the Bruins' multi-wave pivot defense—Sanders, James Wilkes and Company—roughed up the placid Joe Barry and denied him space as well as the ball. And not when Carroll's teammates needed him the most; i.e., when forwards Arnette Hallman and Drake Morris were hurling up enough bricks to rebuild Indy's Monument Circle.

Only Purdue's defense—and 23 points from Keith Edmondson—kept Coach Lee Rose's team in the game. Carroll, who has yet to guard anything but his own privacy, hardly was a factor there, either. "He seemed tired," said Sanders. "He didn't even protect the basket," said Wilkes. "What's the big deal? Alton Lister [of Arizona State] is tougher."

To be fair, Purdue came back from a 10-point deficit, and Carroll (17 points, eight rebounds, six turnovers) did make two vital baskets over the 6'6" Sanders late in the game to pare the UCLA margin to 59-58 and to 61-60. But in between he missed a jump hook that would have given Purdue the lead. Then the Bruins kept making free throws (21 of 25 for the game, 136 of 166 for the tournament), Morris cast off another rock from the corner that landed somewhere near Ohio, and that was that. The fairly gorgeous actress-starlet-model-cheer-leaders of UCLA began celebrating the team's return to the championship game for the first time in five years.

All weekend Larry Brown had referred to himself as "the little Jewish boy from Brooklyn who screwed up this team." He had referred to his helter-skelter Bruins as "wackos." And he had referred to Griffith as "Griffin, or whatever."

After Monday night, Brown may have figured out how to pronounce his executioner's name. At the end, even Vandeweghe was trying to guard Griffith, making it four Bruin defenders to go along with the four Iowans who had tried and failed on Saturday.

One of those Hawkeyes, Bob Hansen, may have said it best. Asked just how good was the wildest-jumping player in the wildest NCAA tournament ever, he said, "I've guarded other guys who could leap high before. But all of them came down."