First Round

TULSA, Okla. (AP)- Six-four sophomore sensation Adrian Dantley went on a scoring tear midway through the second half to power Notre Dame to a 77-71 victory over Kansas in the first-round of the NCAA Midwest Regional Tournament here Saturday night.

In the other first-round game played at Mabee Center, Louisville fought past a quick, scrappy Rutgers, 91-78. The Cardinals, 25-2, will meet Cincinnati, 22-5, in the Midwest semifinals March 20 at Las Cruces, N.M. Notre Dame will meet Maryland.

KU was sluggish in the first half after playing Notre Dame on equal terms for the first five or six minutes. Notre Dame connected on 22 of 27 free throw shots to take a 44-32 halftime lead over Kansas. Notre Dame team speed and the failure of Kansas to penetrate to its big men on offense, Rick Suttle and Danny Knight, limited the Jayhawks in the first half and created the 12-point gap.

Notre Dame pushed their lead to 18 at one point, before Kansas began chipping away. The Jayhawks cut the lead to two at 48-46 in the second half, but then Dantley took over, scoring on three straight three-point plays.

Beginning with a layup with 10:49 left, Dantley scored 19 second half points to finish the evening with 33 points, just above his 30.4 per game average, second in the nation. Operating out of the semi-delay, the Irish moved ahead by nine, then 12 when Dantley broke free for his second layup and added a foul shot. A few seconds later he was open for the third three-point effort, making 11 markers in the matter of minutes, and the score had ballooned to 63-48. It was 65-48 before Kansas could regroup its own offense.

KU�s early foul problem spelled their doom as they lost four players, including starters Clint Johnson, Norm Cook and Donnie Von Moore. The Big Eight champions finished 19-8 on the year.

The KU loss left Kansas State as the only representative of the Big 8 conference left in NCAA tourney play. Chuck Williams and Paul Gerlach scored 20 points each as Kansas State, 19-8, held off repeated comeback bids to upset Penn.

First Round

By Deane McGowen
Special to the New York Times

PHILADELPHIA, March 15- The basketball season is over for both Philadelphia representatives in the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament.

At Palestra tonight before 9,233 rabid fans, Kansas State, runner-up in the Big Eight Conference eliminated Penn's Ivy League champions, 69-62, in the opener of a first-round double-header. Penn was making its sixth straight N.C.A.A. appearance.

Then Syracuse finished off the other local team, La Salle, with an 87-83 overtime triumph. From 81-81 (the ninth tie since the middle of the second half), Syracuse went ahead for good when Kevin King hit a layup on a neat pass from Rudy Hackett with 35 seconds left in the overtime. The Orange added its final 4 points from the free-throw line on shots by Jim Lee and Ross Kindel.

Roy Danforth, coach of Syracuse, said: "La Salle played good defense against us, but we kept our motion. We won because we got the ball inside."

Paul Westhead, La Salle coach, was almost at a loss to explain the defeat. "We outshot them [47 per cent to 45] and we outrebounded them [42 to 38]," he said.

Syracuse's season-leading scorer, Rudy Hackett, got 30 points and 12 rebounds. Jim Lee, one of the finest guards in the East, scored 20 and grabbed eight rebounds.

Joe Bryant led the Explorers with 25 points and had 14 rebounds before he fouled out in the closing minute.

Chuckie Williams and Paul Gerlach scored 20 points apiece to spark Kansas State to a 69-62 upset victory over the University of Pennsylvania.

The Wildcats, runners-up in the Big Eight Conference, scored the first six points in the game and completely dominated Penn to take a 40-28 lead into the halftime dress�ing room.

Williams, a 6-3 junior, hit on long jump shots while the 6-10 Gerlach controlled both boards and contributed key baskets.

Kansas State, 19-8, opened up a 17-point lead with less than three minutes to play in the first half. But Penn, be�hind the shooting of Ron Haigler, rallied to cut the lead to 12 at intermission.

Williams hit his first three shots to open the second half, and the Wildcats again opened 17-point lead with 14 minutes left.

However, the Ivy League champion Quakers started a comeback behind the shooting of Mark Lonetto and Haigler to cut the Wildcats' lead to eight points at the 8:50 mark. Lonetto and Haigler continued to chip away at the Kansas State lead and with 1:08 left Lonetto hit a jumper to cut the Wild�cats� lead to five points at 60-55.

But the Wildcats' Mike Evans, Gerlach and Dan Droge hit pressure free throws to preserve the victory.

Haigler finished with 17 points, Bob Bigelow had 15, and Lonetto scored 14, 10 in the second half. Evans added 13 for Kansas State.

Kansas State coach Jack Hartman said, "It's tough for kids like us to play a nationally ranked team at home, but we got control early and that was the key to the win. I'm very happy, and you have to call it an upset.

Kansas State next plays Boston College and Syracuse meets North Carolina on Thursday at Providence, R.I. 

Regional Semifinal

PROVIDENCE, R I (AP)- North Carolina did all the things you'd expect of a team from the highly promoted Atlantic Coast Conference. But Syracuse was not impressed, and North Carolina, champion of the ACC is no longer in the NCAA tournament

In the Tar Heels' place is a Syracuse team with seven losses, among them defeats to schools like Canisius and West Virginia. And on Saturday the Orangemen will play Kansas State, a team with eight losses, one of which was by 38 points only two weeks ago.

But these two unlikely pretenders to anybody's championship are still in the NCAA's college basketball derby, and one of them will go to San Diego next week as champion of the East Regional.

Sixth-ranked North Carolina is going nowhere because Jim Lee, a 6-foot-2 guard, hit a 15 foot jump shot with three seconds remaining Thursday night. It was the difference in Syracuse's 78-76 upset of the heavily favored Tar Heels.

Kansas State is still in business despite itself. The Wildcats did their best to blow a 15-point lead by throwing the ball away 22 times, but Chuckie Williams, a cool 6-3 guard, calmed his team with two of his 15 field goals and Kansas State prevailed over cold shooting Boston College, 74-65.

Almost nobody believed Syracuse might win, but the Orangemen insisted they weren't impressed with any team just because it was from the ACC. The clincher was applied by Lee after North Carolina, which made four floor errors in the final two minutes, threw the ball away with 27 seconds left.

The Tar Heels were leading 76-75. Syracuse worked for one shot and Lee made it count.

"It wasn't a set play," said Lee, who scored 24 points and hit 12 of his 18 shots. "I just happened to be open. If I'm open, I'll shoot."

North Carolina, 22-8, led throughout the first half. But every time the Tar Heels would get a five or seven-point lead, Syracuse, relying heavily on super-quick guard Jim Williams, would close to within two or three.

The lead changed hands 11 times in the second half, but North Carolina appeared to be in control in the final few minutes as guards Phil Ford and Brad Hoffman, who had 24 and 20 points, hit with consistency.

The only problem was that Syracuse refused to crack, and when the Orangemen, 22-7, got their chance, they capitalized.

"Our only problem this week," said Syracuse Coach Roy Danforth, "was convincing ourselves that we could beat North Carolina. We had three or four meetings this week to talk about it, and we finally believed that we could do it."

And, in the end, they made believers of North Carolina, which lost an East Regional game for the first time since Dean Smith became its coach in 1967.

The difference in the night's second game was Williams, a junior who has a reputation as a shooter. He didn't disappoint anybody, hitting 15 of 25 shots and scoring a game-high 32 points.

Williams, who said he "wasn't afraid to shoot," scored 24 points in the second half and it looked for awhile as if Kansas State, 20-8, would romp. After Boston College took its only lead at 40-39, Williams and Carl Gerlach, who had 20 points, went on a tear and the Wildcats led 63-48 with 9:05 to play.

That's when Bob Zuffelato put his Boston College team into a full-court press, and it unnerved Kansas State so bad the Wildcats went nearly four minutes without even getting off a shot.

Boston College pulled to within two points at 65-63 when Will Morrison, who had 17 points, hit a layup with 2:40 left.

But Williams scored on two jumpers, and Gerlach added a free throw and a field goal. And the second place team in the Big Eight, one which Coach Jack Hartman didn't even believe would break even this year, was still in business.

"It was just a total wreck for awhile," Hartman said of his team�s collapse. "But this is a very young team. And this is the NCAA's finals and we're a long way from home."

Regional Final

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) "There's somebody up there who loves us," said Rudy Hackett. And the way Hackett�s Syracuse Orangemen keep winning, there just might be.

Hackett scored 28 points, two of them on a left-handed shot over his head at the buzzer which sent the game into overtime, as upstart and unheralded Syracuse, 23-7, won the NCAA's East Regional championship 95-87 over Kansas State here Saturday.

The victory, which nullified a Kansas State effort that seemed to have given the Wildcats a ticket to the NCAA finals, sent Syracuse to San Diego instead. The Orange play Kentucky in the national semifinals.

Hackett, a 6-foot-9 senior forward who facially resembles Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, had four points in overtime and combined with Jim "Bug" Williams on the critical play at the end of regulation to seal Kansas State's fate and end the Wildcats' season with a 20-9 record.

"We've been the underdog in every tournament we've played," Hackett said. "I was a little worried when we went into the game 3 1/2 point favorites. We like to play the role of the underdog."

Hackett's tying basket was shot at the buzzer after a feed from Jim Williams, five seconds after another Williams- Kansas State's Chuckie, this tournament's Most Valuable Player- had given the Wildcats a 76-74 lead. Chuckie Williams, who scored a game-high 35 points to give him 67 in two games, had hit from 20 feet in the final seconds after Kansas State had held the ball for a minute to play for the final shot.

But Hackett and Jim Williams had other plans. The little Williams took the inbounds pass and sped down the court, feeding to Hackett in the lane. Hackett said he juggled Bug Williams' pass. "The ball was getting kind of slippery...but fortunately I was able to recover," he said. "Jimmy was telling me if he got the ball, he would get it into me. So I was expecting it. I saw it all the way and just turned around and put it into the basket. It was a set play to get the ball and throw it inside. I wasn't certain I had beat the buzzer. I couldn't hear it."

The shot appeared to leave Hackett's hand just at the buzzer.

"When he (Hackett) bobbled it I thought time would run out," Jim Williams said. �He scared me."

The final five minutes of regulation was an incredible see-saw battle which Chuckie Williams seemed to have ended with his 20-foot shot with five seconds left. But that was before Hackett's heroics.

Hackett sent Syracuse ahead 78-76 at the outset of overtime, but Chuckie Williams tied it at 78-78, the last time Kansas State was to see a portion of the lead. The Orangemen then rattled off six straight points to open a 84-78 lead with two and a half minutes to play.

The clincher came when the 6-3 Lee drove and scored a layup with 1:43 remaining and was fouled on the play. He completed the three-point play and Syracuse, 23-7, had an insurmountable 87-80 lead.

Jim Williams scored six of Syracuse's critical points in the overtime period. Kansas State's Chuckie Williams' basket, a 25-foot jumper midway in overtime, was the only points the Wildcats could score in the critical overtime stretch when Syracuse outscored them 11-2.

Syracuse took an early lead behind the hot outside shooting of Lee, who wound up with 25 points, five of them in overtime. The Orangemen led 18-9 with 11:10 left in the first half, but at that point Lee cooled off and Chuckie Williams heated up.

Scoring 15 points in the first half, Williams brought his 17th-ranked team within one at 18-17. The remainder of the first half was fairly even, but Syracuse did not relinquish the lead until 1:21 remained in the half when Kansas State guard Mike Evans, playing with a face mask to protect a broken nose, hit two free throws to send his team ahead 35-34.

The Wildcats led 38-36 at the half and maintained their lead until Hackett combined with Chris Sease to push Syracuse into a 46-46 tie four minutes into the half.

Syracuse, down 66-62, ran off eight straight points to take a 70-66 lead with just under three minutes to go. Chuckie Williams then scored six of Kansas State's next eight points and the Wildcats took the lead back at 74-72 with 1:31 to play.

Jim Lee tied it for Syracuse at 74-74- the sixth time the game was tied- with with two free throws. There was then 1:05 left to play.

Kansas State, 20-9, came down court and worked for a final shot. After freezing the ball for nearly a minute, Mike Evans dribbled to his left and fed Chuckie Williams in the corner. The shot was perfect and Kansas State seemed to have the game won.

But Syracuse's Jim Williams and Hackett, a second team All-American, still had some heroics to perform, setting up the overtime victory.

For Kansas State, Evans, a freshman, had 20 points, giving the team's guards a total of 55 points.

National Championship

Curry Kirkpatrick

Sport Illustrated

April 07, 1975

Monday night in the San Diego Sports Arena college basketball went off to meet the Wizard of Westwood for the last time. Having arrived in California 27 years ago as something of a scarecrow, John Wooden went out like a most uncowardly lion. UCLA, which under Wooden has failed to win only two of the last 12 NCAA championships, won this one by holding off Kentucky 92-85.

At the finish Wooden remained true to his image; except for an emotional outburst or two during a very emotional game, he was the kindly Tin Man to the end. "I didn't really feel differently about this game," he said. "Just very proud."

Even the Wizard, having announced his retirement on Saturday, must have sensed the extra impact of the game's two most honored schools meeting in his farewell. Here were UCLA and Kentucky, which had won more than a third of all the NCAA basketball titles ever played, evoking memories of Hagan and Ramsey and Issel, of Goodrich and Alcindor and Walton. And here was Wooden one-on-one with destiny.

"It will be sad if he loses," said retired Kentucky Coach Adolph Rupp, "but he's got enough of those darn trophies. Johnny's in against me tonight."

The Bruins also were in against a massive Wildcat squad that had reached the final on muscle, manpower and the deft shooting of freshman Jack Givens. But if the thin list of six Bruins who played in the final, including slender centers Richard Washington and Ralph Drollinger, felt they couldn't handle the burly Wildcats they didn't show it. Drollinger got 13 rebounds and 10 points in 16 minutes, while Washington, who split his time between the pivot and forward, scored 28, added 12 rebounds and found the time to help hold the Wildcats' three hulking freshman centers to eight points. "I even surprised myself," said Washington, the tournament MVP.

The furious pace of the first half, in which there were 15 lead changes and five ties, continued in the second period until UCLA broke away to a 66-56 lead with 12 minutes left in the game. Kevin Grevey, whose 18 first-half points had sparked Kentucky, was silenced by Bruin Captain David Meyers during UCLA's surge. Then Grevey suddenly came alive again, scoring 10 points, and Wildcat floor leader Jimmy Dan Conner finally escaped the defensive clutches of Pete Trgovich. Kentucky scrambled to only a point back with 6:49 remaining.

At that moment the Wildcats had a chance to take the game by the throat. That they didn't was another example of the uncanny luck that UCLA enjoyed all week. With the Bruins ahead 76-75, Meyers went up for a jumper but fell into Grevey and was called for a foul. Screaming and pounding the floor, the Spider was hit with a technical, whereupon Wooden shouted, "You crook!" at Referee Hank Nichols and rushed onto the court.

Kentucky had a possible five-point play- a maximum of three free throws followed by possession of the ball. But Grevey, who finished with 34 points, missed the technical and then the first of his one-and-ones. Wildcat sub James Lee set an illegal pick on the ensuing play, and Kentucky had come up empty.

Meyers then hit on two free throws that were matched by Bob Guyette's bank shot, but the ubiquitous Washington tipped in Marques Johnson's miss for an 80-77 lead. The Wildcats never got closer.

After the game UCLA Guard Andre McCarter, who had made 14 assists, and a key late basket, embraced the 64-year-old Wooden and said, "Coach, I hope you have a nice life." The Wizard's eyes sparkled just a little.

UCLA Assistant Gary Cunningham elected to follow his boss's example and give up his job, leaving the choicest coaching position in college ball open to everybody from Louisville's Denny Crum to San Clemente's Dick Nixon.

Crum, who had wept upon hearing of Wooden's retirement, is not in the best of favor with UCLA Athletic Director J.D. Morgan. That makes the probable choice Gene Bartow of Illinois, who opposed Wooden in the 1973 finals while coaching Memphis State.

With the wisdom of youth, sophomore Johnson spoke for the team when he said about Wooden's successor, "He won't be no half-stepper who doesn't know what he's doing." He better not be. The steps he will try to fill are too big for that.

Before the unfolding of the UCLA coaching melodrama and the games themselves, the Bruins seemed to be the forgotten entry among the final four. What happened was that the game's glittering showcase had come to the sunny Pacific shores, UCLA's home turf, but all people could talk about was how many thousand drunken Kentuckians had closed Bully's bar each night or whether there ever had been anything as hilarious as a Syracuse practice.

Because two teams representing the Commonwealth were there, San Diego was overrun with Kentuckiana. Nobody rode Secretariat across the country, but fans of both Louisville and Kentucky arrived by plane, bus, car and hillbilly wagon. One charter flight ran out of bourbon over Little Rock, Ark., and had to make a refill stop in Amarillo, Texas, lest the thirsty mob storm the cockpit with empty Old Grand-Dad bottles.

Upon their arrival, supporters of the teams took up residence in neighboring hotels on Harbor Island and, depending on their affiliation, a) argued that Kentucky is afraid to schedule games with Louisville or b) inquired Louisville who?

Even Governor Julian Carroll joined the fray. He telephoned the NCAA to ask if he could present the championship trophy to Kentucky in the event the Wildcats won the tournament; he neglected to mention Louisville.

After debating where to go sightseeing, the Louisville team opted for Tijuana. Kentucky visited the zoo.

"Shouldn't your team be favored because of these distractions?" Wooden was asked. "They've seen all this stuff."

"Not with me they haven't," snapped The Wizard. "I went to Tijuana once, and I'm never going back. And you don't have to go to a zoo to be in a zoo."

Syracuse Coach Roy Danforth could testify to that. The Orange rooting section is called "The Zoo" in appreciation of its discerning tastes, but not many fans escaped their cages to make the long trip west. As a result Syracuse was missing a major weapon in its attempt to become something more than the most unlikely team in the finals since 1967, when the legendary Glinder Torain led his Dayton Flyers to the tournament.

The Syracuse menagerie featured The Enormous E, Earnie Seibert, a center who weighs 240 pounds and looks as if he were recruited from a tavern; Bug Williams, who wore dark glasses at practice; and a certain Neanderthal verve that made it a wonder the Orangemen ever got out of their dressing room, much less the East regional. "We're the goof-offs," said Guard Jim (Rat Man) Lee.

Kentucky's Guyette, Grevey and Conner watched the Syracuse practice Friday afternoon and were bewildered.

"Nobody's this bad," said Guyette.

"Who's the clown in the shades?" said Grevey.

"Stevie Wonder," said Conner.

The next day Kentucky- Syracuse turned out to be Ali-Wepner, only with more fouls. Sixty-one personals were called, not including the rabbit punches.

While the Wildcats' yoke of oxen in the pivot, freshmen Rick Robey and Mike Phillips, worked over Seibert, the rest of the Kentucky defense held Orange star Rudy Hackett to three shots in the first half, and UK took a 44-32 lead.

Syracuse went more than four minutes without scoring to begin the second period and Kentucky's margin increased to 22 points. Though the Orangemen recovered to make it respectable, they took a fearsome pounding in the 95-79 defeat.

Another Kentucky freshman, Givens, who made up for Grevey's subpar performance by gathering 24 points and 11 rebounds, revealed his prime motivation. "I love all the excitement," he said. "I love the police escorts."

Everybody knew of the emotion inherent in former UCLA Assistant Crum's face-off with his old school in the other semifinal. Everybody was aware that Pete Trgovich and Ulysses (Junior) Bridgeman had played on the same East Chicago team that had won the Indiana state prep championship, and that the Bruins' skinny guard would be checking the Cards' versatile leaper. But only a few close friends realized the feelings that churned inside Wooden during this final week of his 40-year coaching career.

There had been hints of his departure. Last month Washington State Coach George Raveling reported that this would be Wooden's last tournament. Another Pac-8 coach said Wooden had told him that he was stepping aside.

Though appearing to be in fine health, The Wizard has not been sleeping well, and he has been starting his long morning walks as early as five a.m. A doctor advised him against agreeing to become the coach of the 1976 Olympic team.

Perceptive Bruin players were alerted before UCLA's final contest at Pauley Pavilion when Wooden told his team it would be the last home game "for a few people in this room."

Rumors continued last week. And signs. At a small dinner party the night before the semifinals the Bruin coach watched as a hobbling 73-year-old Rupp entered and had to be helped to his table. At that moment an unmistakable haunted look crossed Wooden's face.

"Hello, Johnny," said Rupp.

The next morning the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner played the story of Wooden's leave-taking all over the front page of its sports section. During the Kentucky-Syracuse game the UCLA coach read the articles about his own retirement. He decided right then he had to clear the air.

Even news of Wooden's departure, however, could not diminish the drama of UCLA's 75-74 victory over Louisville.

This war of attrition was not won in the trenches but in the territory high on the backboards. That is where UCLA's Johnson went to contribute two brilliant defensive plays that saved the game in regulation time and where Washington arrived to score the last two of his 26 points and the winning basket with two seconds left in overtime.

It had been a struggle of savage intensity from the very beginning. Fleet Louisville four times held early nine-point leads as the result of 18 points from Bridgeman and Allen Murphy. But Murphy calmed down a little and Bridgeman, hounded by Trgovich, turned off. Ulysses did not score a basket in the final 37 minutes of the game.

Even after Trgovich fouled out and sore-legged Meyers was switched onto Bridgeman, neither team could take command. With 48 seconds left and Louisville ahead 65-61, Center Bill Bunton blocked two Meyers shots but both times he batted the ball back into Bruin hands. Another desperate leap and Bunton fouled Washington, who made two free throws. On the succeeding inbounds play against UCLA's press, Johnson jumped up to spear Wesley Cox' pass and moments later jammed in the tying basket with 35 seconds remaining.

UCLA was in a semifinal overtime again, the same situation in which the Bruins had been dethroned by N.C. State last year. Meyers said later, "Nobody was thinking back. We were just super lucky most of the game. Then it was time for bread and butter."

And UCLA had plenty of both. And some more luck. After Murphy had scored seven points in the overtime to run his game-leading total to 33 and Louisville took a 74-73 lead, the Cardinals went into a four-corner delay offense starring designated dribbler Terry Howard. With 20 seconds to go UCLA was forced to foul. Howard only had to make both ends of his one-and-one to seal the victory, and he had made all his 28 free throws this season. But Howard missed.

After a UCLA time-out Louisville lined up in a zone defense. The Bruins gave the ball to Johnson far outside; Washington faked toward the foul line, then drifted out along the baseline to receive Johnson's pass. The 6'9" sophomore lifted off, cocked and let go. "Our passive, easy-going, lovely person," as Wooden calls Washington, had cut Crum's Cards to pieces.

Downcast, Murphy and Bridgeman correctly analyzed that everything Louisville had tried had worked. The Cardinals had "given" the game to UCLA because they shot only 59.3% from the foul line and missed the first free throw on three one-and-one opportunities. Nonetheless, it was to the Bruins' credit that when the contest was on the line, once again they were up to taking it.

"I haven't been in that kind of game in a long time," said Meyers. "Both gangs flailing away, no moaning or messing around. It seemed like two UCLAs, one and the same."

Wooden spoke to the Bruins in the locker room immediately after the game. "I'm bowing out," he said in the vast quiet. His eyes went around the room and his voice cracked. "I don't want to. I have to." Then he walked away.

There was one last game to go. But no matter what happened in it, clearly UCLA would never be the same.