Former Villanova great Ed Pinckney, the Most Outstanding Player of the 1985 Final Four, won that honor for outplaying the Most Outstanding Player of the 1984 Final Four, Georgetown's Patrick Ewing, in an all-Big East final. In that title game, Pinckney scored 16 points and the eighth-seeded Wildcats shot a championship game record 78.6 percent from the field against the defending national champs. These days, Pinckney works as a radio analyst and part-time scout for the Miami Heat.
TSN: You were named Tournament MVP for shutting down big, bad
Patrick Ewing. How'd you do it?
EP: Remember, you're not talking about the offensive Ewing that
you have now. You were more concerned about him on the defensive end. Am I gonna get my shot blocked? Is he gonna throw my shot in the stands? How many times am I going to get my shot blocked? If I go to the basket five times, can I get two over him? It's that kind of pressure in playing against him.
I just saw that game. Three o'clock in the morning, it was on. There was one point in the game where he had these two alley-oop plays. You know, I probably jumped as high and as hard as I ever jumped because your adrenaline is flowing in a game like that. And he was still like two feet over me. And I considered myself a good jumper back then. I could really get up and was really athletic. But he was still way over me. They ran that play two times in a row.
TSN: How many times in your career you figure Ewing blocked your
shot?
EP: We played four years against one another, twice a year. Who
knows? He blocked my shot plenty of times. I remember him blocking one
in particular during a regular-season game. We had a lot of momentum
going for us in this particular point in the game. They would always
press and he'd be in the back of the press. Well, at that particular moment, he took a gamble out high, right around the top of the key area, and he tried to make a steal. He went for the steal, committed to it and missed. I had a wide-open dunk. I was just going to throw it right down. He came back from the top of the key area and blocked my shot. That was the turning point in the game. I remember Rollie (Massimino) calling a timeout and being like, "Man, how could we have not had that last basket? You were wide-open."
TSN: They had Ewing. They were the defending national champs.
They'd lost just two games all season -- by a total of three points.
What made you think you could beat those guys, anyway?
EP: We always had close games with them throughout the regular
season. But there was always a point in the game that, boy, if we could
somehow make it through, if they don't press us at this point in the game, we always felt we could win the game. Well, during the regular
season, that never happened. They were always able to make a run. They
were always able to shut us down on the defensive end. And their press always made turnovers against us.
We felt going into the game, if we ever got ahead, we were just going to take our time, we were not going to rush in any manner and we were just going to get the best possible shot we could get. That's all Rollie talked about the whole time. "Get the best shot. I don't care how long it takes. Just get the best shot." And that's what Gary McLain, Dwight Wilbur and Harold Jensen did.
TSN: That seems like such a simple plan. I'm sure Rollie isn't
the first coach to tell his team to be patient and wait for a good shot.
EP: I'm sure coaches stress that. But so many things on the court have to be aligned -- and also the stars. It was just our night. It was the perfect game plan that Massimino put out in front of us. Everyone played the perfect game. And when I say that, I mean that if Harold Jensen had to be a quarter of an inch on the wing to the left, he was exactly there so he could get the shot against their press. It just doesn't happen that way. You don't get the opportunities against that defense that we got in that game.
TSN: Have you ever heard of a team shooting 78.6 from the field,
like you guys did against Georgetown?
EP: No. No one. Not even high school. Michael Bradley, who's
currently with Villanova now, shoots over 70 percent from the field. So
individually, yes. But not as a team collectively in one game. Never.
TSN: Did Georgetown try to intimidate teams with that Hoya
Paranoia?
EP: Oh, yeah. It wasn't anything they said because they didn't
talk on the court. It was just their defense. Their defense was smothering. When I look back at that Georgetown team, that was a good team. And a good defensive team. But I remember two years before that team, there was the other team that played in the NCAA finals against North Carolina. And to me, that was a better defensive team. Statistically, I don't know that to be a fact. But Gene Smith was at the helm. He could defend anyone. They had Fred Brown. Sleepy Floyd was a very good defensive player in college. They were bigger and stronger. And we had seen that team. The seniors on our team had seen that team. So I mean, after three years of fear, you can't be afraid anymore. Certainly, we respected that defense, but we were saying, "All we have to do was get a good shot."
TSN: Two years after the championship, Gary McLain told Sports Illustrated he played the semifinal game against Memphis State while high on cocaine and that he was also high on cocaine when the team met President Reagan at the White House. How'd that make you feel?
EP: I was somewhat disappointed that that came out. We talk about this all the time now. Gary talks about how disappointed he is and how he felt around that time. It was like a cry for help, almost. Now, when he thinks back to that, he says, "You know, I took a lot of heat for many years after that article came out, but I felt good about it because I told my side of the story." Villanova just had a function where they honored that whole team that won the championship. Gary, for the first time, came back and he was received really well. But when I think back to that article, I just remember saying, "Man, how crazy was that? With everything going on during that whole time, (McLain) was just out of it."
TSN: You had no idea?
EP: Right.
TSN: If you had, what would you have done about it?
EP: How do you know? Like in that article, (McLain said) "I want
to smack the President in the back of the head." How do you know?
TSN: Do you keep in touch with the guys from that team?
EP: Yeah. I was down in Sydney watching the Olympics and I had a visit with Dwayne McClain, who's a citizen of Australia. He works for a company that sponsored the team he played on down there. And he was also doing some broadcasting down there during the Olympics. Gary was here in Florida. Mark Plansky is working with ESPN and he's down occasionally, does some Miami Hurricane games. I touch base with
just about all of those guys.
TSN: Where do you keep your ring?
EP: My dad's passed, so my mother has it. But my father wore it
for the longest time. I've never worn my championship ring, in fact.
TSN: Who's the Big East player you least liked during your
playing days?
EP: I don't have anybody I disliked. But you know who used to
beat the heck out of me? (Georgetown's) Michael Graham.
TSN: You and everyone else he went up against.
EP: Yeah. And who's the other big guy from Georgetown? I always
see him at Knick games.
TSN: Ralph Dalton?
EP: Ralph Dalton. We played against each other in a summer league after college. Here I am, in the big, bad NBA going up against Ralph Dalton in the championship game. And man, Ralph Dalton's team kicked our butts. They played that same kind of beat-you-up Georgetown defense. He used to wear those high sneakers and knee pads, just kneeing you all the time. And it was like 10 years later, and the guy was doing the same exact thing.
TSN: We hear there's another Pinckney who can play a little.
EP: My son Schea is a 6-5 sophomore at Gulliver Academy. Six-five with a nice, soft, feathery touch from the outside.
TSN: Are you going to help out your alma mater?
EP: He's been going to Villanova camps. (Former Wildcats coach Steve) Lappas has had him up there for some time. If he got an opportunity to play on that level, it would be the most fun thing to watch him play.
TSN: What's in your CD player?
EP: You know, I couldn't tell you. My son -- I guess they call it burning -- he burns all these CDs for me. I don't know all the artists. But a lot of R&B.; Carl Thomas, people like that.
TSN: Favorite movie of all-time?
EP: I don't know. Maybe The Fugitive.
TSN: Who's the biggest celebrity you got to meet because you're a basketball player?
EP: Muhammad Ali. I met Muhammad Ali at the Ritz-Carlton in
Boston. I'm in the lobby of the hotel getting ready for the game.
I don't know how I started talking to this guy, but I somehow got in a
conversation with his personal photographer. He's like, "Yeah, I'm a
photographer for Muhammad Ali." OK, I have 20 books on Muhammad Ali. I
can tell you his life story. I know everything. So I say, "Wow, man, that must be an unbelievable job -- working for Muhammad Ali." "Yeah, yeah. Why don't you come upstairs and take a picture with him?" I'm like, "No, no. I don't think I could. He's got to be busy." He was promoting this book. But the photographer convinced me to go up to (Ali's) room and it was the best half-hour. It was unbelievable. I mean, (Ali) was doing magic tricks. His son was sleeping, and he woke his son up to meet me. I met his wife. I'm not a big celebrity guy. When I see someone who's a celebrity -- and I see these people all the time -- I leave them alone. I couldn't leave Muhammad Ali alone, though.
