Which team do you expect to win the NCAA men's basketball title?
Rich Hofmann | Hoyas' success fills famous fathers with pride
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Patrick Ewing stood more than he sat in the stands behind the Georgetown bench. John Thompson presided at courtside, right there in the middle, wearing a radio broadcaster's headphones. As their children toiled before them, willing their way, winning their way into the NCAA Final Four, the two of them shared emotions that were the same as every parent's, the same but different. Ewing tried to explain.
"It's very nervous, not only as a fan but as a parent," he said. "When you're out there [playing], you feel like you're invincible, like Superman. You feel like you can leap tall buildings.
"But as a parent . . . " Ewing said, and everyone knew what he was saying even as the thought remained unfinished. Everyone who has kids, anyway.
You dream for them and then you watch their lives play out
before you. You agonize for them and then you hope that the fates are kind. You tell yourself that you are just going to let them go but you never can, never completely. As Thompson said, "What good is being a parent if you can't meddle?"
And then he laughed. Thompson coached Georgetown during the glory days; John Thompson III coaches them now. Ewing was the Hoyas' greatest player in those glory days; Patrick
Ewing Jr. is now a Georgetown junior. And then there was Doc Rivers, the Boston Celtics' coach. His son, Jeremiah, plays for the Hoyas, too. Fathers and sons and eras collided in celebration; hugs, tears, the whole
wonderful deal.
As Thompson spoke, the party on the floor had begun to die down at Continental Airlines Arena. The Hoyas, trailing by
10 points with 7 minutes to go in the second half, had just stunned the top-seeded North Carolina Tar Heels with a 96-84 overtime victory.
The game had been so much fun to watch - so fast, so hard, and played at a brilliant skill
level. The comeback had been
so nervy, coming as it did against Carolina Blue, Inc. The overtime had been so dominating. It was Thompson's job to describe it all on the radio. He said he failed.
"I try to be objective," he said. "But I got to a point where I couldn't say anything. I'm not sure I said much at all in the overtime. I was just stunned."
He is Big John Thompson now, an old nickname that has become a necessary differentiation between him and his son. When Big John talks about the old days, he refers to Big Pat, to
differentiate him from Ewing
the younger. As the years pass, the legends are burnished and the lies grow more outrageous, which is natural enough. But the names are longer now, too, out
of necessity. In that, they know how George H.W. Bush feels.
They have their stories, Big John and Big Pat do - of triumph and disappointment and everything in between. They played in three Final Fours but won only once, in 1984. In 1982, Michael Jordan and North Carolina beat them in a classic final game. In 1985, Villanova beat them in the classic final game.
Those Hoyas played an intimidating style and gave off an intimidating air. The term of art back then to describe it all was "Hoya Paranoia." Of course, people sometimes forget that those also were times when Big East fratboy humor occasionally
