Utah’s Perfect Moment? We Missed It

Posted by James Seaman on January 11, 2009

Arising about noon on the day after the Sugar Bowl, the afterglow of victory burned away any fogginess brought on by the post-game celebration on Bourbon Street. As I stumbled into the living room to awaken my brother and the crew of other raggedy-looking Utahns who’d come to New Orleans for the game, a poignant question seemed to hang in the air: Was this the greatest moment? The pinnacle for Utah sports? And I don’t mean for the University of Utah. I mean for all sports in the state of Utah.

Surely, some misguided BYU fans will tout their 1984 National Championship which ended with a 7-point win over a mediocre 6-5 Michigan squad in the Holiday Bowl (BYU’s 1996 team would have smacked Robbie Bosco’s boys). Utah won the NCAA men’s basketball title…in 1944. The Jazz’s trophy case, of course, still awaits that first piece of hardware. Whether the Utes’ shocking beatdown of heavily favored Alabama to cap a 13-0 campaign represents the apex of Beehive State athletics can never be determined, for the lack of a true champion in college football left Utah’s undefeated season somehow incomplete.

But thinking about the sheer magnitude of my alma mater’s accomplishment cast my memory back to the period that was to have been the state of Utah’s shining moment. More a period than a single day, the stretch from March-June, 1998, saw fans of both the Utes and Jazz poised to bathe themselves in the cleansing waters of long-awaited victory. A roundball hotbed—one where every Mormon ward house sports an indoor basketball court, where the Jazz represent the state’s only professional team, where even less-heralded schools like Utah State and Weber field highly competitive squads—Utah stood at the forefront of the nation’s basketball consciousness.

That was the year the University of Utah men’s basketball team led Kentucky by ten at halftime of the title game, a mere ten minutes away from the promised land; the year the Jazz held homecourt advantage against Chicago in the NBA finals and led the series 1-0. Why insist on taking you down such a seductive yet ultimately heartbreaking path? Well, I earned my graduate degree in history and, as my favorite professor Bob Goldberg once reminded me, historians only know sad stories.

The night that lives most vividly in my mind is Saturday, March 28, 1998, when I watched the Jazz dismantle the Lakers at the Delta Center in a regular season contest—a foreshadowing of their Western Conference Finals rendezvous later that spring. You remember this one, the game in which unintentionally comical Greg Foster directed a throat-slashing gesture toward the Laker bench. If that classic moment had occurred earlier than the 4th quarter, I, along with much of the crowd, would have missed it. We had wandered out to the concourse at halftime and spent the entire third quarter craning our necks up at the mounted TVs, watching Andre Miller dispose of the storied North Carolina Tar Heels in the national semifinal.

Accumulating a triple-double a week earlier against defending champ Arizona, Miller nearly repeated the statistical feat against Carolina. I firmly believe that if Utah would have finished off Kentucky for the title, college basketball fans and historians would talk about Miller’s run through the tourney the way they refer to Danny Manning and Carmelo Anthony. After losing Keith Van Horn to the NBA, Miller went from good to great. He beat—no, blew out—an Arizona team loaded with future NBA guards. With a championship to cap it off, Miller in March would have gone alongside Cheap Trick at Budokan, Johnson in the ’64 election, and Pacino in Godfather II as one of the great performances of all time.

Utah’s accomplishment against the Tar Heels that Saturday night seems even greater when you consider that homegrown Alex Jensen and Drew Hanson matched up against future NBA superstars Antawn Jameson and Vince Carter—and beat them. A victory over Kentucky two nights later seemed pre-ordained, from a fan’s perspective at least, given that Utah had taken out two seemingly better teams in the Elite 8 and Final Four, and that Kentucky didn’t appear as strong as the Wildcat teams that ended the Utes’ season in 1996 and 1997. So when Utah built a 10-point lead at the half, the rest seemed academic. I remember watching from the living room, just hoping that second half clock would melt away. Of course, Kentucky’s depth proved too much for the Utes to withstand as Miller, Mike Doleac and the boys gave up the lead for good with about 6:30 to play. I heard a story a few years ago at that Rick Majerus could still recite the last six minutes of that game, play by play, sequence by sequence. I believe it, given Majerus’ obsessive personality. Visions of what might have been still haunt his dreams.

With Doleac and Hanson graduating, and Britton Johnson leaving for an LDS mission, Miller simply didn’t have enough supporting firepower to lead the Utes deep into the tournament the following year. Utah’s best chance was 1998 and, given the difficulty of putting together an elite college basketball program in a field of over 300 teams, such an opportunity might never happen again. And we all know the sorrow that befell our beloved Jazz the following June. Cast again into the national spotlight, the state and its fans put on a brave face, trying to choke back the tears when fate—or Michael Jordan—cruelly delivered its punishment.

Like Sisyphus, the Jazz had pushed the boulder all the way to the top of the hill, as they had each previous season for time immemorial, only to find it had rolled back down. It would seem one moment, one good year, one season in the sun could make all past and future heartbreaks bearable. And that time was to have been spring 1998. For whatever reason, the cosmic forces seemed to miss each other and the alignment of stars never quite took place; Utahns were left collectively standing at the altar.

Even now, with a Sugar Bowl victory and an unblemished record, that ultimate glory eludes us, as the Associated Press voters could do no more than make the Utes the national runner-up. So, as did Sisyphus, we will go back to the boulder at the bottom of the hill and push behind our teams, still awaiting the day when the rock stays atop the hill and that truly perfect moment arrives.

10 Comments

justalars on January 11, 2009 said:

I still think the 2004 team was better

Warhank on January 11, 2009 said:

Great article.

John M and Kathy M on January 11, 2009 said:

Hey, look at it this way. Greater satisfaction is in the journey rather than reaching the destination. The football elite have mandated that teams like the Utes will be barred from rolling the boulder all the way to the top of the hill. Nonetheless, they can’t deny us the glories experienced in the journey.

Boondock Saint on January 12, 2009 said:

I’m with ya man…still waiting for that perfect moment when the Utah sports world will stand still in sheer and utter elation.

JayRay on January 12, 2009 said:

I knew you’d do a U of U blog! good stuff!

shporq on January 12, 2009 said:

“…where the Jazz represent the state’s only professional team…”

So Real Salt Lake doesn’t exist?

Dallin T on January 12, 2009 said:

That is correct, Real Salt Lake does not exist…as a professional team, anyway. Ever been to one of their games? Didn’t feel very professional to me.

Steve on January 13, 2009 said:

Real Salt Lake is not professional.
When we talk professional we talk about the best sports teams in the world.
RSL would get worked by those European teams.
RSL is comparable to NFL Europe or European “professional b-ball teams.”

It would probably be a bigger deal if the Utah Blaze won a title than if RSL or the Utah Starzz won a title.

American’s don’t care about soccer, especially minor league soccer they play here in America.

James Seaman on January 14, 2009 said:

justalars,
i have to disagree with you, man. no doubt that the 2004 team was more prolific offensively, but there’s something special about a team that just finds away to pull out every close game. i remember after the TCU game when lou holtz said the frogs were better in every conceivable category (on paper), but the utes just refused to lose. i also think this team is going to have a longer reaching impact in terms of the guys they put in the NFL. i’m thinking about kruger, sean smith, beadles (eventually), and sakoda. really, eric weddle is the best pro from the 2004 team.

canadajazz on January 15, 2009 said:

I don’t live in Utah, but I sure feel for Utes players and fans who were robbed royally by this ridiculous voting process. If there’s a tournament to decide other NCAA sports, why is football exempt? Conversely, why not have the press simply vote for the Pittsburgh Steelers (for example) and avoid a Super Bowl altogether?

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