I’m offering a list of my ten favorite games of all time, for each venue (live, television, videotape, radio) that I have experienced.  (I’ve watched a couple of games via internet, so I guess that will be a new category when I update this in the future.)

I tried to avoid “historic” moments, like the Heidi game or Jim Marshall running the wrong way, unless they were terrific games too.

I tried to avoid personal “historic” moments as well.  My first hockey game (a minor league game my Dad took me to around 1960), or my first Twins game (when you could still see the cows in the pasture beyond leftfield), or my first NBA game, or the first time I saw the Japanese national high school baseball tournament on television, were all great stuff, but grist for a different list.

I tried to avoid games where the setting was the star, like a soccer game I saw in the Amazonian jungle in Bolivia played on a clifftop, or when I won a sports radio challenge to score two tickets to a Timberwolves luxury box, or when I got to go on the field (with my sons) at the Tokyo Dome to deliver the Embassy’s message to a Japan-U.S. all star game.  Those were all pretty cool, but they had nothing to do with the games that were played. 

And while this whole list is personal (lots of these games would ever make a non-Minnesotan list) I skipped the completely personal moments.  Watching my sons and daughter play was better than anything on these lists.

I did not take too long to do this, so I might have to add something if anyone responds with different favorites.  (I did not see some obvious choices – at least for Minnesotans – like the 1995 Sweet 16 final between Minneapolis North and Staples-Motley.)  Even more than most lists, this is personal and has no right or wrong choices, and I would be interested in hearing everybody else’s favorites as well.  It would be interesting to see how different the lists are for members of different ages too.  I look forward to everyone’s thoughts on this.

Alan  

LIVE

1962 (college football) Minnesota vs UCLA Rose Bowl

Minnesota triumphs, and I got to go to Disneyland.

1963 (high school basketball) Marshall vs Cloquet state championship game

The greatest tournament game ever, until this year.

1966 (high school basketball) the three Edina games in the state tournament

I don’t think any team has had a more exciting run in the tournament.  Great games, great drama.  I think this was Edina’s first championship of any kind, wasn’t it?  Oh, well.  Nothing’s perfect.

1977 (international men’s basketball) Athletes in Action vs. Soviet national team

Great basketball, and when the Soviet ref continued to blatantly cheat to help the Soviet win a tough game, the American (Pac 10) ref started cheating back to give the Americans a chance.  Besides the political drama, it was a great game of basketball.

1977 (college football) Minnesota vs Michigan

Gophers upset #1 Wolverines to win the Little Brown Jug for the first time in years.  Exciting game capped by sour-faced moneybags Michigan alums behind me shouting at me to sit down, and me shouting back at them to stand up.  Sweet victory.

1979 (high school boys basketball) Minnesota vs Indiana all star game

Randy Breuer, Ben Coleman, Greg Downing and company thumped ‘em.  Really the first time I saw what Minnesota high school basketball COULD be.

1987 (baseball) Twins vs Cardinal World Series game 7

Game 6 was probably a more exciting game (Don Baylor home run fuels comeback capped by Hrbie’s grand slam) but how can I not include my team finally winning it all?

1991 (high school hockey) sectional finals

I guess I’m breaking my “personal” rule here (it was either this or my high school winning its only football game of the season my senior year – homecoming yet – by defeating a team that didn’t lose another game all season) but this was the first game that I took my still-new Japanese bride to in Minnesota, and she enjoyed it so much (first hockey game, the big school then the small schools, the crowd) that I loved it too.  Everything that’s great about high school sports, including the Mom for one player who kept imploring “Joe! Joe! Joe!” and then falling silent whenever her baby was on the bench.  Loved it.

1991 (baseball) Twins vs Braves World Series game 6

Hard to have a better game – in a more thrilling setting – than Kirby had in this one.  Still remember Leibrandt weeping as he walked off the mound at the end. 

1997 (men’s college basketball) Minnesota vs Clemson NCAA regional semifinal

Perfect timing, we were in San Antonio for one night on a big car trip (Disneyland, Las Vegas, Grand Canyon etc.) brining my in-laws to California for their return to Japan after visiting us in Mexico, where I was working at the time.  I got a great seat from a scalper for a great game.  Sam I Am was great in the fist half, Jackson was unreal (playing a jillion minutes with 4 fouls) in the second half and overtimes.   

Don’t know if the 1972 college basketball game between Minnesota and Indiana counts as live or television, since I saw it a couple of hundred feet away from the action on the big screen in the hockey arena with the crowd that couldn’t get into the game.

Special historic note for tiny Sherburn winning the final single class Minnesota high school basketball tournament.  They proved that non-metro teams could win long before my old alma mater did.

Special mention to the “Niedermeyer – dead!” baseball game between Minnesota and Northwestern.

TELEVISION

1967 (baseball) Twins vs Red Sox final weekend

The last two games of the regular season were awful for a Twins fan, but great games to cap a great season.

1969 (high school hockey) Warroad vs. Edina state championship game

Edina could have made a seamless transition to WWF villain after this one.

1972 (Olympic basketball) USA vs USSR Olympic gold medal game

Great game, great ending, great drama that never ends.

1974 (men’s college basketball) UCLA vs North Carolina State national semi final

UCLA had a lot of exciting games that season (Notre Dame came from 11 down with 3 minutes left to end their 88 game winning streak, there was a great Maryland game I saw live, and a couple of earlier nailbiters in the tournament) but this was a classic.  David Thompson, Tom Burleson, Monte Towe (6’4, 7’4 and 5’4) and future MLB journeyman Tim Stoddard beat John Wooden and Bill Walton, Keith Wilkes, Dave (brother of Ann) Meyers, a team so deep they had Marques Johnson and Richard Washington (and 7’2 Ralph Drollinger) coming off the bench!  Won’t see college basketball like that anymore, even with the one year stay in school rule. 

1975 (NBA basketball) Phoenix Suns vs. Boston Celtics game 6 NBA Finals

Not only the shot “Heard” round the world, but a great, great game by Paul Westphal.  It was great to shut up Red Auerbach and Tommy Heinsohn and Johnny Most and the Celtic crowd in mid celebration.  Too bad they got to celebrate anyway when it was over.

1982 (men’s college basketball) Minnesota vs Iowa

Gophers beat Hawkeyes to take the Big Ten lead (they officially won the title the next week with their last game, against Ohio State as I recall.)  So many things to like about this one.  The Gophers won on the road in front of rabid fans – in the last game ever at the old Iowa fieldhouse.  Each clock ending was dramatic, from Breuer’s block at the end of regulation to send it to overtime, to Zebedee Howell’s steal to close one overtime period, to the final foul that allowed Darryl Mitchell to hit the winning free throws with no time left on the clock.  And we beat Lute.  Great stuff.  

1991 (baseball) Twins vs Braves World Series game 7

A great game, a great performance, and the climax to the best series I have seen in any sport.

2003 (college football) St. John’s vs. Mount Union Division 3  national championship game

I wrote at length about this game elsewhere.  The perfect corny Hollywood script come to life.

2004 (women’s college basketball) Minnesota vs Duke NCAA regional final

Lindsay beats (gak) Duke’s player of the year (no regional or demographic bias in that selection) to cap the great turnaround following the long deserved ouster of Cheryl (I was fired for racial reasons!) Littlejohn.

2006 (men’s college basketball) Winona State vs Virginia Union Division 2 national championship game 

Winona State was in charge much of the game, but great to see Minnesota small college basketball triumph.

The 2006 playoff run by the Phoenix Suns, and all those great Magic-Bird matchups from the 80’s, deserve to be here somewhere, but which games?

Speaking of Bird and Magic, the special historic note would be their 1979 NCAA championship game.  Not really as a great game as many remember, but what a portent of things to come.

Special mention the 1998 World Cup, where I watched the end of the game at the Consulate in Monterrey as the Mexican’s team diminutive star squeezed past two giant Dutch defenders to score the tying goal as time expired.  As I said at the time, when I watched that final rush I saw him pass from star to hero to legend within the space of a few seconds.  The Mexican staff at the Consulate absolutely went wild with joy.  Really great moment. 

I hate the Red Sox, so I won’t include the 2004 ALCS.

VIDEOTAPE -1

1976 (ABA basketball) Nets vs Nuggets championship game

I saw this many years later on ESPN Classic.  What a great game, and what a perfect way for the ABA to go out.

1980 (Olympic hockey) USA vs USSR Olympic hockey semi final

You may have heard of this one.

 

1982 (college football) Stanford vs Cal

“Oh my God, the band is on the field!”  I went to UCLA, and our most hated rival was not USC, it was the Stanford band.  Seriously.  They were the most obnoxious bunch of spoiled brats you could imagine.  As I watched the greatest play of all time in any sport, I was screaming (in joy) at the television “Daddy can’t get you out of this one!”

2007 (high school boys hockey) Hermantown vs Warroad class A state semifinal

2007 (high school boys hockey) St. Thomas Academy vs Duluth Marshall class A state semifinal

2007 (high school boys hockey) Grand Rapids vs Burnsville class AA state semifinal

Don’t know if these three hockey games will make the lists next year, but they were great games that are still fresh in my mind, and this is a comparatively new category.  The three basketball games that follow, however, will stay on the list forever.

2007 (high school boys basketball) Ellsworth vs Cass Lake-Bena class A state championship game

Just a great game, with a great star from a high school with less than 50 students, and a great opponent whose fans sing the Chippewa tribal anthem along with the national anthem.

2007 (high school boys basketball) Buffalo vs Lakeville South class AAAA state semifinal

I wrote about this at length too, but with the injured star, the big mean football players from the big bad suburban school, it was thrilling stuff for a Buffalo alum to watch.

2007 (high school boys basketball) Buffalo vs Robbinsdale Armstrong class AAAA state championship game

I also wrote about this at length, but the game itself was better played than the semifinal, and the double digit comeback in the second half – with an injured star, a second star woozy from a fall, a third starter playing ill with the flu, a distinct size disadvantage at every position, and the star of the game battling foul trouble – with a last second basket to win the championship in my alma mater’s first appearance in the state tournament in 76 YEARS was really like a dream come true.  (And the fact that the team genuinely seemed like really good kids, and the fact that the crowd was clearly rooting my school on, was icing on the cake.)

Special historic note would be the 2001 Cretin-Derham Hall vs Osseo high school boys basketball class AAAA state semifinal.  Cretin put on the greatest three-point shooting display in the first half that I had seen to that point, but Osseo came back in the second half to beat them.  Good game, but not ten best.  I will hang onto that videotape, though, to watch a very talented Joe Mauer play basketball.

RADIO

Don’t have ten, but I have a couple.

1968 (college football) Minnesota vs USC

John Wintermute’s late, slow motion kickoff return touchdown after receiving a lateral gave the Gophers a fourth quarter lead, but O.J. broke our hearts on the final drive.

1973 (college baseball) Minnesota vs USC College World Series

Speaking of breaking our hearts, I remember listening to this while squirming in my car at Lake Minnetonka.