Men's Basketball: Back in Time #2

June 18, 2007

NORMAN, Okla. -- Each Monday in June, July and August, SoonerSports.com will take you back in time with the OU men's basketball program as we highlight some of the biggest games and biggest names from the 1970s, '80s, '90s and 2000s.

The second installment features a non-conference battle of top-10 teams at the end of the 1984-85 regular season as Bobby Cremins' Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets visited the OU campus.

Was Wayman Tisdale, who was playing in his final regular season home game as a Sooner, able to rally Oklahoma back from a double-digit second-half deficit? Or did Mark Price, Yvon Joseph and John Salley help Georgia Tech pull off the road upset?

March 3, 1985
No. 10 Georgia Tech at No. 6 Oklahoma
Box Score

With 7:30 remaining in a Sunday afternoon game late in the season, Oklahoma trailed 10th-ranked Georgia Tech 72-60 at Lloyd Noble Center. OU's 31-game home winning streak was in serious jeopardy.

Then, Wayman Tisdale and the No. 6 Sooners, who won at Nebraska only the day before in their Big Eight finale, mounted a comeback for the ages.

Tisdale, a junior who was playing in his next-to-last OU home game, scored nine points during a game-ending 27-8 run that gave Billy Tubbs' crew a memorable 87-80 victory in front of a boisterous sellout crowd of 11,619 and a national CBS audience.

The run coincided with the fouling out of 6-11, 245-pound Georgia Tech center Yvon Joseph. The 27-year-old "Haitian Sensation" scored 16 points and grabbed seven rebounds before picking up his fifth personal with 7:17 remaining.

OU capitalized on Joseph's absence by scoring the next 13 points over a three-and-a-half-minute span to take a 73-72 lead, its first advantage since the 4:30 mark of the first half. After a back-and-forth next couple of minutes, two Tisdale free throws gave the Sooners the lead for good with 1:50 left, 79-78.

Tisdale ended the day with 28 points (21 in the second half), 11 rebounds and three assists while playing all 40 minutes. Sophomore forward Darryl "Choo" Kennedy logged 22 points, six boards four assists and three blocks, and junior guard Anthony Bowie finished with 14 points, seven rebounds and four assists.

"That comeback has to be the greatest in Oklahoma basketball history," said Tisdale after OU improved to 25-5. "It looked dark, but we didn't give up on ourselves."

The Sooners' late heroics spoiled the return of Mark Price to his native state. Price, an Enid product and the older brother of future Sooner Brent Price, paced the Yellow Jackets with 20 points and seven assists.

Said Tubbs, "The crowd won it for us. I thought the crowd was unbelievable. It was the most enthusiastic basketball crowd I've ever been around on my side, and it helped us tremendously.

"I sure wouldn't want to go play Georgia Tech in Atlanta," added the quotable head coach about the ACC co-champion. "They could give me a ticket, but I sure ain't going."

Oklahoma finished the regular season ranked No. 4 in the AP poll while the Yellow Jackets closed at No. 6. Both teams reached the NCAA Tournament's Elite Eight, with OU falling 63-61 to Memphis State and Georgia Tech losing 60-54 to Georgetown.

NOTES: The game was played with a 45-second shot clock and no 3-point line ... Tisdale's double-double was his 15th of the season (he finished the year with 20) ... Oklahoma allowed only one Georgia Tech field goal over the final nine minutes (a Mark Price layup with 3:15 remaining) ... OU trailed 43-39 at halftime despite shooting 63.0 percent in the first 20 minutes (17-for-27).

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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