MILWAUKEE -- When Jim Boylan woke up Wednesday, he knew exactly what March 28, 2012 symbolized. It was 35 years earlier that Boylan and his Marquette University teammates won an NCAA championship.
But Boylan, a starting guard on that team, didn't spend the day simply reminiscing by himself. He soon joined many of his former teammates in downtown Milwaukee to take in a play about their former coach, Al McGuire.
"A lot of memories flooded back," Boylan said after arriving at the Marcus Center for the show. "It doesn't seem like 35 years ago. It just seems like yesterday. One of the things that after the game was over that Coach told us was that, what we had just accomplished, as you go on in your life, it will become greater and greater to you. And that's been true. As time has gone on, it's just been bigger and bigger."
For Boylan's teammate Bo Ellis, that especially rang true. While the 1977 national title was certainly a defining moment in Ellis' career, he didn't appreciate it as much at the time. Back then, he was busy preparing to play in the NBA. But now, the championship has become a much more memorable moment in his life.
"I guess as you get older in life, it becomes more special," Ellis said. "I never used to wear my NCAA championship ring. When you're younger it doesn't mean quite as much. It means a lot, but as you get older, it becomes more special."
Ellis, now 57, was the team's captain and leading rebounder. Even 35 years later, Marquette fans still approach Ellis about that championship season.
"You have so many people remind you, so many people come up to you that are older now that say they were little boys at the time," Ellis said. "They look at me and say they were 10, 11 years old when we won a national championship 35 years ago. When I look at some of them, I feel pretty good about my age and how I look when some of them tell me how old they are when we won it.
"It's always a special moment, especially in March. It never becomes old. A night like tonight, on this night 35 years ago, with Coach McGuire being gone, it makes it a little more special."
It was a little more than 11 years ago that McGuire died at age 72. But the experiences he shared with his players continue to be a play a large role in their memories of their time at Marquette.
"One of the things about Coach, it was a lot of fun to play for Al McGuire," Boylan said. "When you went on the road, it was like a traveling circus. Whatever town we landed in, the media attention, they all wanted a piece of Al. They all wanted to see this rag-tag group of basketball players and how he's disciplined them and put them in a structure and put them into this thing known as Marquette basketball.
"Being around him was exhilarating. It was always exciting. Coach was always coming up with something or doing something on a daily basis that made your life interesting."
One interesting thing McGuire and his players did was take unique team photos, the most famous being the championship team's picture in which they wore tuxedos and posed near an old-time vehicle. But that picture and the tricked-out uniforms Ellis helped design weren't the only snapshots of the team's uniqueness.
"One year we were playing out at Air Force Academy and we had one game, but we stayed out there for a week because it was over Christmas break," Boylan recalled. "He took us skiing and just had a good time. We could have been back here in Milwaukee by ourselves with no one on campus, so he just packed us all up and took us out there. We went out three days early, stayed two days after the game. We just had a lot of fun.
"But he was a tough coach. There were days that I walked out of practice where I was mumbling and cursing and did not want to see that man."
Though the players were gathering Wednesday night on the 35th anniversary of winning the championship, they do more than simply meet up at reunions.
"We all talk all the time," Ellis said. "I pretty much talk to all of them very frequently. We're all still very close. Not just when it gets to tournament time, but all the time. Not only were we teammates, but we were family. Thirty-five years later, we're still family and we still look at it that way."
Since Ellis, Boylan and the rest of the then-Warriors won the title, Marquette has yet to win another. But if it does happen, the players would be happy to share the spotlight.
"I always want the university to do well," Ellis said. "It would be nice for them to get another one. I have no problem with that. They just have a lot of work to do. It's not easy. Now, the norm is teams just want to get to the Final Four. Our goal was always to win it all. The prize is not just getting to the Final Four. The prize is being the champion. That's how we'd approach it."
The closest any Marquette team has gotten since then was the Final Four. That was in 2003 when Dwyane Wade was playing in his final college season.
The 2011-12 Marquette team entered the NCAA tournament as a No. 3 seed but lost in the Sweet 16 for the second straight year.
"I really liked this year's team," Boylan said. "I thought they had a chance."
So, for at least one more season, McGuire's group of "ragtag" players in 1977 remain the only Marquette championship basketball team.
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