Favorite Moments/Games in Pitino Era?????

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Gopher_In_NYC

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It was gonna end, so glad it ended with a good effort. There are other threads to complain, so I respectfully ask that you stay on point in this one.

Let's put some positivity on it and recall your favorite moment/games.

I'll start with a couple -

Beating Iowa this year in OT on XMAS - it made for some viewing for several weeks and help me and I'm assuming others better manage a COVID winter.

Joey King crying after beating Maryland when we were 0-13.

Here's a clip -

 

Beating Michigan St in the Big 10 Quarters in 2017 and Louisville in Des Moines, 2019. Gopher fans really turned out strong for the NCAA weekend, great time down there.

Both games key players went down though.
 
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Beating Wisconsin's 2014 Final Four team wire to wire at the Barn after Andre Hollins got injured like 30 seconds into the game.

Carlos Morris getting fouled on a game-tying 3 point make against Michigan State in East Lansing in 2015, followed by missing the game winning free throw, but going on to win in overtime.

8 game conference winning streak in 2017

Brock Stull's back to back 3's in our win against Wisconsin in the Kohl Center in 2019.

Beating a top 15 ranked Purdue twice in two weeks en route to Pitino's second NCAA tournament appearance.

Marcus Carr's late game heroics to beat Ohio State in Columbus in 2020, not to mention beating a #3 ranked Ohio State at home that year, when they likely would have gotten to #1 if we had lost.

Wild finishes against Iowa and Purdue this season where we snatched victory from the jaws of defeat

And getting to watch a fresh batch of Gopher greats in Nate Mason, Jordan Murphy, Amir Coffey, Daniel Oturu, and Marcus Carr.

(And the first tall white guy to not be widely hated in Liam Robbins!)
 


Hasn't happened yet. Waiting for the desk packing and cake send off at Bierman
 


In Brooklyn seeing Collin Sexton single-handedly score (with just two other teammates) and make the game close at the end.
Same game early on, watching Richard Coffee explode on fans courtside hassling Dupree and Amir.
Drinking beers with Rick Pitino, Richard, and Gopher coaches after their first game in Brooklyn at the teams hotel.
 


freshtrout said:
In Brooklyn seeing Collin Sexton single-handedly score (with just two other teammates) and make the game close at the end.
Same game early on, watching Richard Coffee explode on fans courtside hassling Dupree and Amir.
Drinking beers with Rick Pitino, Richard, and Gopher coaches after their first game in Brooklyn at the teams hotel.
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Nate Mason ABSOLUTELY destroying Sexton's ankles and embarrassing him like a little clown as he took a look down at him BEFORE nailing the 3 was easily better than anything Sexton did the rest of the game. If you're actually a Gopher fan, that was the moment.
 

mplarson7 said:
I'd vote the win against Louisville in the NCAA tournament a couple years ago. That win just felt SO good.
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I'm with ya. Gabe going off and Reggie Miller pumpin' him up. I loved that.
 



WriterGoph said:
Nate Mason ABSOLUTELY destroying Sexton's ankles and embarrassing him like a little clown as he took a look down at him BEFORE nailing the 3 was easily better than anything Sexton did the rest of the game. If you're actually a Gopher fan, that was the moment.
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Oh yeah, saw that right in front of me. The game was over right there. Then the fight, and mayhem ensued. 40 or so of us went on a Creative Charters Gopher trip.
 

Somebody managed to update Richard’s Wikipedia page with the following: He requested a waiver of the NCAA to only play Loyola Marymount in 2021, but was quickly denied and told he had to play all of the teams in the Big Ten. He could be heard loudly weeping throughout the Minnesota countryside that night.
 


Big ten tournament run and Louisville W.....Unfortunately not enough of these moments and too many depressing ones in the B10.
 



People have already mentioned the Louisville win and that MSU BTT win, but also won't forget:

-- The end of the MSU NCAA game in Des Moines when the Gopher crowd chanted Jordan Murphy (that was super dusty and special).

-- Nate Mason taking over in West Lafayette and us beating Purdue in OT in 2017.

-- Plenty of Jordan Murphy moments when he had monster games. Loved that guy!

-- Carr's game-winner at OSU last year.

-- Beating Michigan at the Barn this year in such convincing fashion!
 

LesBolstad said:
A sneaky one for me was Gabe knocking down a game winning 3 just a few games into his career vs. a really good Washington team. I think it won an early tournament(?); man I thought he was going to have a brilliant career the way he shot it as a freshman.
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I know, crazy how Gabe's shooting touch is now that of a middle-schooler.
 

LesBolstad said:
A sneaky one for me was Gabe knocking down a game winning 3 just a few games into his career vs. a really good Washington team. I think it won an early tournament(?); man I thought he was going to have a brilliant career the way he shot it as a freshman.
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That was in Vancouver. They won both of their games. Gabe so clutch.
 


LesBolstad said:
A sneaky one for me was Gabe knocking down a game winning 3 just a few games into his career vs. a really good Washington team. I think it won an early tournament(?); man I thought he was going to have a brilliant career the way he shot it as a freshman.
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Good one Les - that's when they had a couple of future NBA draftees on their roster. I remember thinking, I got 4 years to look forward to this and he's got the onions to take that shot!!
 

Beating Purdue in West Lafayette in 2017 and then the run of wins against Iowa, Michigan, and at Maryland that same season.

Beating Providence at the Dunkin Donut Center early in the 2017-18 season

Beating Purdue on Sr Day and in the Big 10 tournament 2019

The Louisville game

Carr's heroics

Pitino's teams definitely gave me some of my favorite players of the past 30 years. Mason, Coffey, McBrayer, Murphy, Lynch (player, not person), Oturu, and Carr.
 

The 8 game winning streak in 2017 was great. The Michigan game at the Barn on a Sunday night was a classic I was lucky to attend. Went into OT and we held on. It was insanely intense start to finish.
 


Beating Purdue on senior night in 2019. Being in the student section and storming the court, was one of the most fun atmospheres I’ve ever experienced, and led to a great tournament win over Louisville.
 

Nice looking back at these moments. I really enjoyed the Louisville win, Gabe’s 3 versus Washington, I watch Murphy’s put back dunk versus Penn State every so often, and also the Iowa win this year.
 

First year, late in the season. The Charles Buggs game vs. Iowa. Iowa was ranked and it was a must win for our tourney hopes (which didn't happen).

At least that's what sticks out for me when I ponder the question.
 

balds said:
First year, late in the season. The Charles Buggs game vs. Iowa. Iowa was ranked and it was a must win for our tourney hopes (which didn't happen).

At least that's what sticks out for me when I ponder the question.
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Interesting choice, as it leads me to one of my favorite Pitinoisms -

In the presser, "Charles Buggs? Who Knew!"

Still makes me laugh!
 

While not the finest moment in Minnesota basketball, I'll remember the Alabama game where we went 5 on 3 for the final 10 minutes.
 

Chronologically:

Year 1: The NIT finals in Madison Square Garden of course

Year 2: not many positives here but the surprising late season victory at Michigan State would be my choice

Year 3: the surprising victory against a good Maryland team in an otherwise horrific year

Year 4: the 8 game winning streak late in the season (a real rarity in the Pitino tenure) and the victory over Michigan State in the Big Ten tournament quarterfinals

Year 5: Nothing (if I had to pick something it would be Murphy's dominating performance at Providence early in the season)

Year 6: Best moments came at the end (OT victory against PSU and victory against Purdue in the Big Ten tournament quarterfinals, NCAA tournament victory against Louisville); second place: going 4-1 against power conference teams in the non-conference schedule

Year 7: another soul crushing season but I would say just being able to see Daniel Oturu's fine year

Year 8: Two victories: against Iowa and especially against Michigan, a team I thought the Gophers had no chance of beating after the first contest
 

LongLiveMilesTarver said:
Carr's heroics

Pitino's teams definitely gave me some of my favorite players of the past 30 years. Mason, Coffey, McBrayer, Murphy, Lynch (player, not person), Oturu, and Carr.
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You know, that's an interesting comment. Perhaps because Pitino's teams have depended so often on individual heroics and we lived and died on the game by game fortunes of his stars, those stars are more etched in our minds than they might have been if Pitino's teams had been more like well oiled machines pumping on all cylinders.
 

I am going to say the first half of that Alabama game in 2017. We were in the top 25, we had what felt like a S16/E8 type team. We were absolutely HOUSING this Bama team everyone loved. At that point we started a Sr/So/So/Jr/Jr, and we were going to replace mason the next year with Jelly who had a nice game that day plus add in this guy named Oturu the following year. At halftime of that game Pitino looked like everything was going great not only for that day but the future! Then the scuffle, we win but no one notices, eventually Lynch gets the boot, guys get hurt and we never reach the heights I thought we could have. Kind of a microcosm of the Pitino era, small glimmers of "hey we might be really good for a while!" only to be followed by dramatic falls from grace.
 


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