TUCSON, Ariz. -- After the Arizona Wildcats' victory over Cal last weekend, the talk quickly turned to this:
Was the 36-point fourth quarter, capped by a 47-yard Hail Mary on the final play, the greatest finish in school history, in any sport?
We say yes.
I put together a list of possibilities, and then four of us affiliated with FOX Sports Arizona -- myself, writer Steve Rivera, director of communications and marketing Brett Hansen and on-air talent Todd Walsh -- took a vote. Rivera and I have covered Arizona for (gulp) about 25 years, while Hansen and Walsh have former ties to the university and are well-versed in its athletic history.
In fact, without Hansen, there would be no "Leap by the Lake." He coined the term in 1998 after Ortege Jenkins' flip into the Husky Stadium end zone in 1998.
Anyway, such a list is always more art than science, and your mileage might vary. But we combed the archives and our memories as best we could to come up our top 12 finishes in Arizona history (Pac-10/12 era only; we're not that old). The list broke down into six for football, six for basketball, and then we added three more amazing endings that definitely should not be forgotten from other sports.
Have an opinion? Let us know in the comments section ...
It's only a week old. You remember this, right?
In one of the greatest victories in school history, freshman Max Zendejas kicked a 48-yard field goal on the final play to beat ninth-ranked Notre Dame 16-13. Check out the video to see the stunned reaction from the Irish players. And the finish has a great backstory. Zendejas told blogger Javier Morales in 2009 that he almost didn't come back for the second half after being furious that coach Larry Smith didn't let him try a 52-yarder right before halftime. Players and coaches had to talk Zendejas back off the bus and onto the sideline. (The kick starts at the 58-second mark of the video.)
Arizona had the ball at the Washington 9, down 28-24, with 12 seconds left, out of timeouts. Quarterback Ortege Jenkins, in what would otherwise be remembered as an ill-advised do-or-die scramble up the middle, went airborne at about the 3 when confronted with a trio of Huskies. The defenders hit Jenkins low, sending him head over heels, nearly landing on his feet in the end zone. Coach Dick Tomey has said it was the most unbelievable ending he has ever seen.
Craig McMillan scored on a layup with one second left after picking up a deflected length-of-the-court from Steve Kerr. McMillan's shot gave UA a 63-62 overtime win against an A.C. Green-led Oregon State team on Jan. 23, and the Wildcats would go on to win the Pac-10 by one game, their first league championship under Lute Olson. "Craig's Mr. Clutch," Kerr told the Tucson Citizen. "When the game's on the line, go to Craig." Fans stormed the McKale Center court, a rarity that wasn't repeated until Jason Terry hit a late jumper to beat No. 3 Stanford in Jan. 1999. (That play just missed out on our list.) By the way, we asked Olson about his favorite ending to a game. He answered in one word: "McShot."
Can't find any video of the play, but please accept this wonderfully nostaglic 1988 Wild About the Cats video in which McMillan makes an appearance.
Max Zendejas became known as an ASU killer, making a 45-yarder on the final play in Tempe for a 17-15 victory. As far as this list is concerned, that's his fantastic finish moment, but his other daggers against the Devils can't be ignored. He hit field goals of 51 and 32 yards in the fourth quarter of a 16-10 win in 1984, and was even better a year later. Zendejas matched the school record with a 57-yard field goal with 5:29 left, tying the game at 13, and nailed a 32-yard game-winner with 1:43 to go. Arizona won 16-13, denying ASU the Rose Bowl.
Lute Olson earned his 500th career victory in style, as Miles Simon picked up a loose ball against fifth-ranked Cincinnati with a couple of seconds left and launched a 65-shot than banked in for a 79-76 win at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix. The Bearcats had inbounded the ball with 3.8 seconds left, but the ball was stripped and Simon was credited with a steal before dribbling once and heaving the ball from the opposite 3-point line.
Kansas was ranked No. 1, featured future pros Paul Pierce, Jacque Vaughn, Raef LaFrentz and Scot Pollard, and had suffered only one loss all season. And then came the underdog Wildcats. Mike Bibby hit two free throws with 18.2 seconds left for an 85-82 lead and then UA fans held their breath as the Jayhawks got off three 3-point attempts in the final decision, the last coming from the corner from LaFrentz at the buzzer. When it meekly grazed the front of the rim, Arizona arguably had its biggest win ever ... until beating Kentucky for the national title 10 days later.
Take your pick here. There was the step-back jumper that beat Oklahoma State 79-78 in the Sweet 16. There was his long clear-out 3-pointer from up top with 2.5 seconds left to knock out UCLA 76-73. And there was his 14-foot double-pump jumper with 0.6 seconds left that lifted Arizona to a 70-68 win over Arizona State, giving the Cats their 11th Pac-10 title and Lute Olson his 305th Pac-10 victory, breaking the mark held by John Wooden. (Go all the way to 1:08.52 to see the winning shot vs. Oklahoma State.)
Arizona trailed Nevada 21-0 in the first quarter and was still down 10 points with under two minutes to go -- and the Wolf Pack had the ball at the UA 7-yard line. The defense held Nevada to a field goal, setting up a wild comeback. Matt Scott directed a 75-yard drive, capped by a 2-yard touchdown pass to Austin Hill with 46 seconds left. After Arizona recovered the onside kick, Scott quickly went to work again -- 28 yards to Garic Wharton, 21 yards to Hill and 2 yards to Tyler Slavin (who was misidentified as Terrence Miller because of an in-game number switch to avoid duplicate numbers on special teams) with 19 seconds left. John Bonano converted the PAT for a 49-48 win.
He banked in a shot to beat Arizona State in 1984, completing Arizona's first season sweep of the Sun Devils since 1969-70, but his story was even more improbable on Jan. 5, 1985. The Wildcats trailed by seven points with 37 seconds left. Then, Smith converted a 3-point play, ASU missed a one-and-one situation, and Morgan Taylor hit a jumper to cut the lead to 60-58 with nine seconds left. Smith stole a deflected ASU inbound pass, made a scoop shot and was fouled. He made the free throw with three seconds left for a 61-60 win. With a lot of help from Smith, Lute Olson quickly established his two-decades-plus dominance of ASU.
Arizona cornerback Darryll Lewis, in the midst of a Jim Thorpe Award-winning season, made one of the most spectacular tackles in school history to preserve a 22-17 victory over Oregon. The Ducks had the ball at the UA 9 in the final seconds, fourth down, when quarterback Bill Musgrave took off for the right corner of the end zone. Lewis burst from the back of the end zone and met Musgrave about six inches from the goal line, turning the quarterback sideways and out of bounds. "It's absolutely the last play of the game, it's absolutely do or die ... I mean, what a play," coach Dick Tomey told me last year. High honorable mention: Also in 1990, D-Lewis picked off Tommy Maddox in the final minute of a game at UCLA and returned it 70 yards for a game-winning touchdown in a 28-21 win. (Lewis' stop of Musgrave starts at 5:37 of the video, but enjoy the whole thing.)
The win was only against Washington State, but the circumstances were remarkable. The Wildcats were down 85-74 with 1:40 to go before Damon Stoudamire took control and WSU was assessed a technical foul because a fan threw a cup on the court. Stoudamire hit 1 of 2 free throws after the technical for a 91-90 lead, and UA survived into OT when Isaac Fontaine made only 1 of 2 foul shots with one second to go. Stoudamire, in a brilliant display, scored 11 of his 40 points in the second overtime as the Cats won a wild one, 114-111.
(On my ballot, the first two here are non-negotiable top 10 in school history, but they didn't make that cut from our four-man panel.)
Arizona trailed 7-0 heading into the bottom of the seventh against Maine in the first game of the 1986 College World Series. The Cats still trailed 7-6 in the bottom of the ninth when Dave Shermet, pinch-hitting for Kevin Long, hit a two-out, two-run home run. "That was the single most-exciting moment as a player or a coach," coach Jerry Kindall told the Tucson Citizen in 2004. "That is going to be etched in my mind more than any moment I've ever had." Arizona went on to win its third national title. (The homer starts at the 49-second mark of the video; footage of the national championship celebration is at the end.)
In a shot more unlikely than a Hail Mary or a three-quarters court heave, Marisa Baena holed a 147-shot from the fairway for an eagle during a one-hole playoff against San Jose State for the 1996 national title. The Wildcats ended up winning by a stroke.
Reshea Bristol hit a 19-foot jumper at buzzer for a 91-90 victory that ended Stanford's 48-game Pac-10 winning streak in a game that stands as one of the biggest wins in program history.
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