YouTube buried treasure: 1990 - two for the price of one

Heading into the Final Four, my bracket is once again a loser - making it 21 years and counting without a pool victory.

As I mentioned in a previous post, the closest I ever came to winning was in 1990 when I was in fifth grade and entered my father's office pool. That year, I finished second in the pool, losing on a tiebreaker (to my dad) when UNLV hammered Duke 103-73 in the final.

I had Oklahoma picked to reach the final in my bracket, and had they managed to defend the baseline against Carolina, I could have been the winner. As it was, the $80 second prize was like winning a million dollars to an 11-year-old.

Speaking of UNLV, let's now enjoy their national championship victory/team slam dunk contest against Duke...



In reality, this highlight package doesn't even do justice to exactly how badly the Runnin' Rebels whipped Duke's ass in that game. At one point in the second half, UNLV went on an 18-0 run, also known as "the most hilarious two minutes and 54 seconds in basketball history".

Of course one year later, Duke upset an unbeaten UNLV team in the semifinals, which helped usher in the current era of Duke's obnoxiousness, now into its third decade. I've long held onto the belief that UNLV lost that game on purpose, however I recently watched the entire game on the wonderful NCAA Vault website, and have changed my tune on that.

Enjoy the Final Four.