The Start Of Something Big

Adds Bascom, "Geno said it best: 'The biggest story of the year is if we lose.' "

And that's what makes the members of the 1990-91 team poster girls for an innocent time. "Geno was very good about never making it 'Us against the world,' " says Baer. "It was more, 'O.K., this is what we need to do.' And only after the fact did you have a sense of what you'd accomplished. Sometimes ignorance is bliss. He kind of painted the picture, and we all went along for the ride."