Product Details
The Best Game Ever: How Frank McGuire's '57 Tar Heels Beat Wilt and Revolutionized College Basketball

The Best Game Ever: How Frank McGuire's '57 Tar Heels Beat Wilt and Revolutionized College Basketball
By Adam Lucas

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Product Description

A legendary coach and five New York City players move south and change the face of college basketball forever.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #516937 in Books
  • Published on: 2006-10-01
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Hardcover
  • 232 pages

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

The 1956-57 North Carolina Tar Heels started the season as a group of basketball transplants at a football school. They ended the season as one of the most famous teams in college basketball history.
Frank McGuire assembled a team cut in his own image - they were brash, they were talented, and they were of course, from New York. McGuire believed he could relate more closely to New York players, so he established the famed Underground Railroad from New York City to Chapel Hill. He believed the talent he recruited would pay dividends with a possible championship run during the 1958 season; instead, they made their magical run one season ahead of schedule.
The team of swaggering Tar Heels played just eight games at home during the 1956-57 season. But it didn't seem to matter, as they went on the road and won a series of heart-pounding games. Five points at NYU. A double-overtime win at Maryland. Five points at Wake Forest. A two-point scrape against the Deacons in the ACC Tournament.
Throughout the miraculous run, the players maintained an impossible air of calm, always punctuated by All-America Lennie Rosenbluth announcing in the post-game locker room how many games were left in the undefeated season.
Before his prediction could come to fruition, the Tar Heels had to survive the most intense Final Four ever. Carolina needed triple overtime against Michigan State and triple overtime against the legendary Wilt Chamberlain's Kansas squad.
That game was The Best Game Ever. And they might have been the best team ever.

About the Author

Author Adam Lucas is the publisher of Tar Heel Monthly, the nation’s most widely read magazine devoted to University of North Carolina athletics. He is a past winner of the North Carolina Sports Columnist of the Year Award, and the featured columnist on TarHeelBlue.com.

Customer Reviews

This should settle the arguments!5
It's really two games. I invited neighbors over to watch on my new TV. Most were NOT big basketball games. We were playing Michigan State. We had professors pounding on the floor and yelling. One woman couldn't stand the three overtime tension any more and locked herself in the bathroom. When a close friend who had been out of town returned home, I said, "You missed the greatest game ever." But then we had to play Kansas and Wilt Chamberlin. Coach put his shortest player on the floor to tip-off against Wilt. The crowd roared with laughter. Psyched Wilt out of his socks. The game went to triple overtime. I always said the team ("four Irishmen and a Jew") was made up of Drama Majors. Every game in their undefeated season was a cliff hanger. This book captures the whole story, the undefeated season, the finals, the whole nine yards. Don't miss it!

A Pleasant Trip Down Memory Lane/Tobacco Road.4
"The Best Game Ever" is about the 1956-57 University of North Carolina basketball team. All 5 starters and the coach, Queens own Frank McGuire, were New York City guys-"5 Irishmen and a Jew", as the coach termed it. McGuire is the principal character here as the Tar Heels sprint to a perfect 30-0 season and the NCAA championship. The spotlight is on the '57 tournament, in which Carolina won triple overtime victories on successive night to take the college crown. Those victories came against Michigan State in the semi and the University of Kansas in the final. There is virtual play by play commentary on the Kansas game as McGuire and rival coach Dick Harp match strategies. One wonders why the Jayhawks failed to make more use of 7-1 center Wilt Chamberlain or why they let the Tar Heels back in the game by slowing the pace late in the contest. This reviewer would have appreciated a fuller epilogue: What happened to these Tar Heels, especially the colorful McGuire? Chamberlain was so distraught by the loss that he dropped out of school, not to return to the UK campus for over 40 years. There are some factual glitches: Niagara University is located in Niagara Falls, not Buffalo and the old St. Ann's Academy was run by religious brothers, not priests. Also, what "back entrances" of the old Madison Square Garden did kids sneak in? This reviewer -and all his buddies-would have loved to known about that one! Despite the nitpicking, BGE is highly recommended. It is just what it purported itself to be, a straightforward sports story of a specific and special time in college basketball. A solid 4 stars is an appropriate rating but the faithful will wish to add back that 5th Carolina blue and white star.

Greatest Gift Ever5
I gifted this book to my father, a former ACC player and huge college basketball fan. He started reading it the day he got it, went to bed and finsished it the next morning! Even though these games were played over 50 years ago, they are still every bit as exciting today. A MUST read for any college basketball fan.