When Bobby Knight took over the Indiana job in 1971 at age 31, the UCLA dynasty was beginning to decline. He got results immediately. In his first season, Indiana made it to the NIT, which was still a big deal at the time.
Indiana won the College Commissioners Association Tournament in 1974 when North Carolina State broke up the Wooden dynasty, and then went 31-1 in 1974-75, largely because Scott May broke his arm. In the 1975-76 season, Indiana finished first with a 32-0 record, including a victory over Michigan in the national championship game.
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Among Indiana’s stars is 6-foot-11 Kent Benson, a standout college player. Watching from afar: Former assistant Mike Krzyzewski, in his first season with Army.
In a historical footnote, this team may have had one of the greatest players in history, Larry Bird, who signed with Indiana and enrolled in 1974.
He left after about a month, overwhelmed by the size of the school and the hostility of Benson, who at one point took a ball away from him and told him that freshmen “don’t need balls.”
Imagine what it would have been like if Bird played in Indiana from 1974-75 to 1977-78. There’s a legitimate argument to be made that the Indians will win four straight national championships. IU almost had two straight wins during its freshman and sophomore seasons. He burst onto the scene as a junior in Bloomington, and there was no stopping him during the 1977-78 season.
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He was also likely to be taken No. 1 in that year’s draft, with Boston’s Cardinal Auerbach taking him sixth overall as a draft-eligible junior, which would have allowed him to begin his NBA career with the Portland Trail Blazers and possibly team with Bill Walton (who would later join him as a Celtic).
Less than a decade later, Portland also missed the chance to draft Michael Jordan. The basketball gods have been cruel to this team.
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