With 1 minute 26 seconds to go and Michigan leading dogged George Washington by only a bucket, Ray Jackson wandered over to press row and shook his head.
“Man, we can’t shake ’em!” he said.
Jackson did not look like a man on the verge of collapse, nor did his teammates. Mighty Michigan finally did shake the 12th-seeded Colonials, but the 72-64 final score doesn’t reflect how narrowly the West Regional’s top seed escaped a shocker.
A George Washington win would have echoed louder than top-seeded De Paul’s loss to eighth-seeded UCLA in the second round of 1980’s West Regional.
It would have been one of the biggest upsets in tournament history. But it turned out only to be the second close call-wakeup call?-in five days for the Wolverines, who needed to go to overtime Sunday to slip past UCLA in Tucson.
Michigan is supposed to be better than this.
“Coach (Steve) Fisher probably has the toughest job in America,” said George Washington coach Mike Jarvis. “They’re supposed to win and beat every team they play by 20 points.”
Instead, the Wolverines actually seem to enjoy seeing how fine they can cut each victory. When Juwan Howard fouled out with 2:03 left, he traded smiles with the Fabs who remained on the floor.
“We come into a situation where other teams might choke or lose . . . I don’t know what it is we do,” said Chris Webber, who called the game “one of the ugliest victories in Michigan history.”
The Wolverines blew an early 13-point lead, then rallied from a three-point deficit with 8:11 to go.
“We came out tight,” said George Washington forward Nimbo Hammonds. “It was just a matter of us gaining our composure and finding out that we could compete with these guys.”
Few seemed to think they could, including, perhaps, the Wolverines. George Washington, one of the last teams added to the 64-team field, is made of humble stock. The Colonials went 1-27 as recently as 1988, and this is only their third NCAA tournament appearance, the first since 1961. Their first tourney win came seven days ago, when they shocked fifth-seeded New Mexico.
But none of that seemed to matter when Sonni Holland put back a miss with 18:30 left in the game to tie the score at 35 and get a big Kingdome crowd roaring.
The Colonials certified their upset bid when Holland slipped under Webber, who outweighs him by 25 pounds, to score on a layup with 10:40 to go. That put George Washington up 48-47.
The Colonials edged ahead by three, but Michigan answered by threading the ball to Webber, who knocked down a layup and foul shot to tie it at 50 with 9:26 to go.
The Wolverines finally won it at the line-not by making free throws, but by scooping up missed free throws. Three times they chased down rebounds to keep the ball away from the Colonials.
“You have to pull out all the tricks sometimes,” Webber said. “Some games, that will not happen at all. You can’t rely on that.”
It was a reverse of Michigan’s second-round squeaker against UCLA. In that game, the Wolverines fell behind by 19 before rallying. This time, Michigan stormed to a 15-2 lead in the opening six minutes. The Colonials appeared completely intimidated.
“When we went down 15-2, I was afraid my mother had gone shopping and that she’d missed the game,” Jarvis said. “Thank God the guys got us back in it.”
After their initial 15-2 deficit, the Colonials went on a 13-4 run from the 13:44 mark to 10:07, cutting Michigan’s advantage to 19-15. They had weathered the knockout blow, and suddenly Michigan appeared flustered.
The Wolverines put on another mini-burst to take a 32-23 lead, but George Washington spun off 10 of the half’s last dozen points to go into the locker room down only 35-33.
When George Washington pushed them, the Wolverines could have folded. Other teams certainly would have begun pointing fingers as the turnovers (Michigan committed 20) piled up. But the Wolverines stuck together, with each of the Fab Five scoring in double figures.
“We do things to overcome bad efforts,” Webber said. “We don’t try to play bad. Maybe we’re just trying too hard.”
