Northwestern was down by one and seconds away from losing its fifth straight Big Ten game before NU forward Jim Stack launched a desperation half-court shot with the final buzzer sounding.
When the ball bounced off the glass and into the hoop, the 1982-83 Wildcats men’s basketball players knew it was their season.
“We had to have that bucket, and it was incredible,” starting point guard Michael Jenkins said of the shot that beat Wisconsin on Jan. 29, 1983 and pushed the Cats’ conference record to 3-4.
“It was the turning point in our season,” Jenkins said. “It was one of those must-win games if we were going to see any postseason action. It kept our hopes live.”
This year’s Cats have postseason aspirations, as well, after recently securing a winning record. But while the current NU team has received much attention for its success, it hasn’t produced as much magic – or as many victories – as the 1982-83 squad.
That team introduced the NU men’s basketball program to the postseason. Using a troop of local talent and an unusual homecourt advantage, the Cats set a single-season school record for victories with 18.
“We were the first team to overcome the losing tradition,” Jenkins said. “We were the first to succeed, and we helped pull the school over the hump.”
Hometown advantage
Although the Cats had 16 home games on their schedule that season, they didn’t play a single game in Evanston.
The renovation of NU’s basketball facility into Welsh-Ryan Arena forced NU to practice and play games elsewhere. So every day the team piled into vans and commuted to Angel Guarding Elementary School, the same north-Chicago facility used by the Bulls.
“We had to travel as a unit whenever we played, and it was the most memorable aspect of the season,” said John Peterson, reminiscing about his sophomore year. “We constantly had to coordinate our plans, and the adversity brought us closer.”
Practicing off campus helped the team develop unity, and playing games at DePaul’s Alumni Hall gave the Cats a hometown edge, if not a homecourt one.
NU regularly filled the 5,323-seat arena, and the fans remained close to the action. The bleachers were right on top of the court, placing the fans only a whisper away from the players.
“We got really good crowds, and it was intimate,” said Rich Falk, who coached the 1982-83 team and is currently a Big Ten assistant commissioner. “It got really loud, and we had great support that year.”
The Cats fed off the crowd noise to post a 14-2 “home” record and won seven Big Ten games at home en route to an 8-10 conference mark.
Hometown talent
While the current NU team has more players from Europe and Plano, Texas, than from Illinois, the 1982-83 squad was built around local products. Falk recruited heavily in the Chicago area and signed two consecutive recruiting classes ranked in the Top 20 nationally – but these classes still ranked only eighth best in the Big Ten, at a time when the conference was a national powerhouse.
“We went after anybody and everybody in the area who could get into Northwestern and who could play,” Falk said. “Once we got a few local players, they kept coming.”
Six of the local players that Falk attracted became the core of the 1982-83 squad. NU started the same five players in all 30 games, and Paul Schultz was the first player off the bench every time.
Senior guards Michael Jenkins and Gaddis Rathel helped provide stability for a team loaded with scorers. Jenkins, who now works in marketing for a Chicago wine and spirits company, was a savvy point guard. He excelled at spreading the ball around for a team on which the fourth-leading scorer averaged 9.8 points per game. Jenkins provided leadership on offense, and Rathel gave the Cats a defensive presence.
“Gaddis had the ability to score 30 points in a game, but he sacrificed his scoring to help improve our team,” Jenkins said. “He was very athletic, and he was a great defender on the ball and off it.”
Rathel could focus on defense because the Cats had three offensive threats in the frontcourt – Jim “Smoke” Stack, Art Aaron and Andre Goode – who all ended their collegiate careers with more than 1,000 points.
Stack led the team in scoring in 1982-83 and spent five seasons playing professionally overseas before returning to Chicago to work in the Bulls’ front office. He is now an assistant coach for Isiah Thomas’ Indiana Pacers.
During the 1982-83 season, the sophomore Goode accompanied Stack in the post. Goode was a talented center who played with Charles Barkley, Karl Malone and Kevin Willis on the United States’ 1983 University Games team.
He went on to play in the inaugural year of the U.S. Basketball Association on the same team as John “Hot Rod” Williams, before playing professionally in Spain, Italy, France and Argentina.
“It was a phenomenal experience playing with the University Games team,” said Goode, who now lives in New Jersey and works for AT&T. “After not making the NBA, I’m glad I got to play in all the different countries, because it was a great cultural experience.”
Forward Art Aaron, who contributed 14 points per game in 1983, was also drafted into the NBA. Aaron gave the Cats a perimeter scorer to compliment Stack down low.
Hometown success
The 1982-83 Cats were the NU first men’s basketball team in 15 years to post a winning record. NU started the season 9-0 and won its first two Big Ten games. But the team finished eighth in the conference despite a respectable 8-10 Big Ten record.
“The Big Ten was an incredibly competitive conference in the early 1980s,” Peterson said. “You had to win your home games and you hoped to steal one on the road.”
NU demonstrated the importance of playing at home when it rebounded from a 16-point road blowout at the hands of Illinois to win the rematch five days later.
The team again showed it could play with the best when it fell just five points short of upsetting Bobby Knight’s No. 2 Indiana Hoosiers.
“The team had a lot of talent, and we could have been significantly better,” Falk said. “We had all the ingredients of an (NCAA Tournament) team.”
The Cats appeared to be a team of destiny when they knocked off Notre Dame 71-57 on St. Patrick’s Day, in the first round of the National Invitational Tournament. The Fighting Irish were led by John Paxson, who later played for the Bulls alongside Michael Jordan.
In the second round, NU faced local rival DePaul at Rosemont Horizon, now known as Allstate Arena. The game was a marquee matchup between the Chicago area’s two best teams.
The Cats took control of the game and needed only to preserve a nine-point lead in the final three minutes to advance.
But the winningest team in school history couldn’t win one more. The Cats didn’t hit a basket the rest of the contest, and DePaul evened the score with seconds remaining.
NU’s miraculous season came to a end when the Cats found themselves on the wrong end of a half-court prayer. A 35-foot, buzzer-beating shot from DePaul’s Kenny Patterson knocked the Cats out of the NIT.
“I was initially very disappointed with the loss to DePaul,” Jenkins said. “But I was not going to let the loss ruin the excitement of the rest of the season.”
