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March 28 marked the 30th anniversary of one of the most famous NCAA championship games ever -- the 1977 final between Marquette and North Carolina. It was the last game Al McGuire would ever coach. Edgewood's Dudley Bradley was a freshman for Dean Smith's Tar Heels while Kevin Byrne, the Ravens' vice president of public and community relations, sat courtside at the Omni Arena in Atlanta.

Byrne was Marquette's sports information director when McGuire's collection of high school standouts gave their Hall of Fame coach the perfect goodbye gift -- his first and only national championship.

***

Long before there was Rivals.com and AAU super teams, street agents and Agent Zero, the Fab Five and Five-Star, there was Al McGuire, the street-wise, wisecracking, always entertaining, remarkably successful charismatic coach of the Marquette Warriors.

"Seashells and balloons, French pastry and white knucklers" -- McGuire was Dick Vitale without the noise. He was a shrewd recruiter with a cutting sense of humor who out-coached rivals not with the Four Corners or Motion Offense but with a complete understanding of the game and an amazing ability to sell it.

"Al always said it was tough being the master of ceremonies," Byrne said. "He always saw the big picture. He was the idea guy, the closer. He knew his job was as much to put people in the seats as it was to win games. I knew three people who could look at a situation and describe it in very few words -- Jim Brown, Art Modell and Al McGuire."

Byrne worked with McGuire for four years. For the last 26 years he has worked with Art Modell's NFL franchise, which was sold to Steve Bisciotti three years ago. Modell bought the Cleveland Browns in 1961, moved them to Baltimore in 1995 and is still a minority owner. Byrne was a loyal confidant and ally to both Modell and McGuire and is now one of the most respected front office executives in professional sports.

"How lucky have I been, to be with the both of them?" Byrne said from his spacious office at the Ravens' training complex in Owings Mills. "Al and Art are a lot alike. Both are from New York. Art was a high school dropout who worked his way up. Al was the tough street kid from New York who also worked his way up." 

Byrne was a high school wrestler at St. Edward in Lakewood, Ohio. In 1967 he enrolled at Marquette, where he wrestled, majored in journalism and often interviewed McGuire for the school newspaper, The Tribune.

"He always called me the 'rassler,' because I would interview him after practice with my wrestling gear on," Byrne said. "My first day on the job as the SID I went down to talk to Al and he said, 'Hey, I remember you, you're the rassler.' I didn't realize the mark he left on college basketball until I left."

That was in the spring of 1977 when Byrne took a job with the St. Louis Cardinals, beginning what is now a 29-year career in the NFL. It came just a few months after McGuire's Warriors beat North Carolina, 67-59, to win the 1977 national championship. 

***

One day earlier, Byrne, trainer Bill Weingart and five Marquette players -- Butch Lee, Bo Ellis, Gary Rosenberger, Bill Neary and Craig "Stretch" Butrym -- boarded a bus for the Omni Arena in Atlanta for a voluntary, one-hour shootaround. Each team was allowed one hour of practice time and McGuire wanted Byrne to make sure Dean Smith and Carolina were off the court at noon. Hank Raymonds, who succeeded McGuire as Marquette's head coach, and Rick Majerus, who went on to great success as coach at Utah and was Byrne's roommate on the road, were McGuire's assistants, although both were unavailable.

"Hank was speaking at the National Coaches Convention," Byrne said, "and Rick was recruiting in Cincinnati."

Where was McGuire?

"He went for a ride on his motorcycle. Back in those days you couldn't rent one. Al had to buy it and then sell it back to the dealer when he was done. But that was Al. He lived for the moment."

And Byrne was certainly enjoying his, as the clock struck 12 and North Carolina's allotted time on the Omni floor was over. 

"We get there," Bryne said. "It's me, the trainer, two guys in sweats and three guys in jeans. Carolina's in all blue. Their coaches are in blazers and they're working hard. I told the NCAA guy it was 12 o'clock and it was our turn to take the court. Well, Dean [Smith] is looking around for Al and the team and all he sees is us. We take the court and shoot around for about a half-hour and left. It was actually pretty funny. But that was Al. He didn't care if our guys even went to the shootaround. He just wanted to make sure Dean was playing by the rules."

The gamesmanship may have helped because one night later a national television audience watched the clock tick down and McGuire fight back tears on the bench as his Warriors gave him his first championship.

***

Phil Ford, Walter Davis, Dudley Bradley, Bo Ellis, Butch Lee, Jerome Whitehead -- the talent on the floor in the championship game was nothing short of awesome, among the best high school players of that era.

Carolina was led by Ford of Rocky Mount, N.C., the All-American point guard who ran the Tar Heels vaunted Four Corners Offense. 

In 1975 Bradley led Edgewood High of Harford County to a state championship. He was a strong, 6-foot-6 defensive stopper who went on to play nine years in the NBA. Against Marquette, though, he was slowed by an injury and played just five minutes.

Mike O'Koren was a freshman from Hudson Catholic in Jersey City, N.J., while Walter Davis of South Mecklenburg High in Charlotte was Carolina's best overall player.

Ford, Davis, injured forward Tommy Lagarde and Mitch Kupcak, who graduated from Carolina a year earlier, were all members of the United States men's basketball team that won the gold medal at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal.  Dean Smith was head coach of the Olympic team, which did not include one member of McGuire's Marquette Warriors. Not Bo Ellis of Parker High School, the 1973 Player of the Year in Chicago, or Jerome Whitehead of Waukegan High in Illinois or Gary Rosenberger of Marquette High in Milwaukee or Bernard Toone of Gorton High in Yonkers, N.Y., one of the nation's most heavily recruited high school seniors.

Instead, Butch Lee was Marquette's lone Olympic representative in 1976 -- not for the U.S. but for Puerto Rico.

Lee was the glue to the Warriors and as good as any point guard in the country. At the Olympic Games he poured in 35 as Puerto Rico nearly staged a monumental upset, losing to the U.S., 95-94. He was also an example of McGuire's uncanny knack of bringing high profile, inner city talent to the small, Jesuit college in Milwaukee.

"Al recruited Butch Lee's mom," Byrne said. "He told her he would take care of him and he did. Whenever he'd recruit in the city (New York) or a tough neighborhood, he'd put a $20 bill in his sock. That way if someone came up to him asking for money he'd say, 'All I have is 20 bucks and it's in my sock.'

"Al used to say he didn't want a kid with green grass on his front lawn. He wanted a kid with cracks in the sidewalk."

Butch Lee was that kid. He grew up in Puerto Rico but was raised in the Bronx and possessed a street toughness and basketball I.Q. that reminded McGuire of. . . McGuire, who literally grew up in his father's bar in Rockaway New York. 

"He was a bouncer there," Byrne said, "and he used to say if you were about to get into a fight and the guy takes his watch off, call the cops because he's been in a fight before."

McGuire went to St. John's Prep in Queens and then to St. John's University, where he was one of the best players in the country under another famous McGuire named Frank (no kin). He eventually took the job at Marquette in 1964 and quickly used his inner city roots and savvy to upgrade the Warriors' talent pool.

"He recruited quickness, guys who could play defense," Byrne said. "Al only ran about five plays but his teams were as disciplined as any team in the country."

In 1966 McGuire recruited George Thompson from Brooklyn. Then it was Maurice Lucas from Pittsburgh, Lloyd Walton of Chicago, Earl Tatum from Mt. Vernon and in 1974 Bo Ellis and Butch Lee. Lucas led the Warriors to the 1974 final against David Thompson and N.C. State, a game the Wolfpack won 76-64. Ellis and Lee led the Warriors back to the title game three years later as seniors.  This time the result was different. 

Lee scored 19 points and was named the Final Four outstanding player though it was a subtle McGuire defensive move that slowed down Ford and Carolina's Four Corner offense. He had Bo Ellis play a one-man zone in the lane, forcing Ford to dish it off every time he tried to drive. Eventually, an Ellis blocked shot on Bruce Buckley led to a Marquette basket that turned the game around and helped the Warriors win.

***

The 30th anniversary of Marquette's national title was held earlier this month in Milwaukee. Byrne was there. So were Ellis, Lee, Rosenberger and many of the Marquette players. McGuire was not. He died of leukemia on Jan. 26, 2001, just two days before Modell's Ravens won Super Bowl XXXV in Tampa. Byrne couldn't go to the funeral because of the Super Bowl but he did visit McGuire at his hospice room in Milwaukee earlier in the season. 

"It was the first time I ever took a day off during the season," Byrne said, "and I'm glad I did. Al taught me a lot. I learned to enjoy the moment. When we went to the Super Bowl, I made sure I looked around and saw what was happening. I made sure my wife and four kids were a part of it. I told our staff to make sure to savor it because you don't know if you'll ever get back."

McGuire made it back to a few more national championship games as a broadcaster for NBC, but never as a coach. When the final horn sounded on March 28, 1977, in Atlanta, McGuire was fighting back a stream of tears that led him to leave the court suddenly and bolt to Marquette's locker room. Byrne was in hot pursuit.

"I told him he had to go back out," Byrne said, "but he said no. He said it was Hank's team now, he was done."

Eventually McGuire did rejoin the celebration, although before he did he said something Byrne has never forgotten: 

"It isn't often a kid from the street touches the silk lace."

The Master had seen the big picture again.  

Posted March 30, 2007