Jan. 11, 1992: Arizona’s 71-game winning streak at McKale Center ends
During Arizona’s 71-game winning streak at McKale Center, UCLA had been victim to No. 10, No. 32, No. 44 and No. 56.
If anyone seemed capable of breaking the streak in the 1991-92 season, it figured to be No. 16 LSU, which arrived at McKale on Dec. 7, 1991 with Shaquille O’Neal in his final college season.
A year earlier, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, O’Neal scored 29 points and had seven dunks as the Tigers thumped Arizona 92-82.
But instead of being a streak-stopper, O’Neal was held to 10 points (no dunks) and fouled out with 4 minutes 48 seconds remaining. Arizona rolled to its 65th consecutive win at home, 87-67.
A month later, after the undefeated and No. 2 Bruins worked out a day before tipoff, star forward Don MacLean told reporters, “I think we’ve got a good chance of winning.”
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It took MacLean’s career game, 38 points, to beat the Wildcats 89-87, in a game decided with 1.8 seconds remaining.
Guard Darrick Martin swished a 10-foot jumper to end a streak that began Dec. 4, 1988.
“This has been like hell here,” said Martin.
Said UCLA’s Gerald Madkins, “What this means to me is that I’ll go down in UCLA history.”
Until that Saturday afternoon in 1992, Lute Olson had been the real streak-breaker in the UA-UCLA series. When he was hired in 1983, the Wildcats were 1-20 against UCLA teams dating to 1923. Most of the differentials were humbling: 111-58, 84-48, 90-45.
But Olson and his team clinched its first Pac-10 championship at UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion in 1986, and had beat the Bruins in 10 of their last 13 meetings.
Everything changed in the nationally televised game on Jan. 11, 1992. In a game that featured 27 lead changes, the Bruins took an 81-74 lead after Pac-10 referee Tom Harrington called what appeared to be a phantom technical foul on Olson with 5:55 remaining.
Harrington was about 30 yards away from the UA bench when he stopped, turned around and signaled a technical.
“I said nothing,” Olson told reporters after the game. “I think it was retaliation for a technical they gave (UCLA coach) Jim Harrick in the first half.”
The feud between Olson and Harrington — a five-time Final Four referee — was such that Harrington never worked another Arizona game. He was fired by the league a year later even though he had called three national championship games.
After Olson’s technical against UCLA, the Wildcats ultimately tied the game at 85, but never again led.
The ’92 Bruins comfortably won the Pac-12 at 16-2 and went 28-5 before losing to Indiana in the Elite Eight. Arizona didn’t seem to fully recover after the streak was broken; the Wildcats completed the regular season by losing at UCLA and USC and were then stunned and eliminated in an NCAA Tournament first-round game against East Tennessee State.
Now, in retrospect, 24 years after the streak was stopped, it remains one of the most historically significant games at McKale, and surely one of the most absorbing games.
Martin, a point guard who had strongly considered playing at Arizona, said he cried in the locker room because “we finally – finally – got our chance to celebrate. Last year we should have beat them here.”
There was no lasting effect to the streak’s demise. Arizona beat the Bruins at McKale 99-80 a year later, and 96-69 the following season.
Where are they now? Martin played 14 seasons in the NBA, was an assistant coach for the Minnesota Timberwolves and is now UCLA’s radio analyst.
How it’s remembered: Arizona’s 71-game streak remains the longest in Division I college basketball since 1991-92. The longest in history is 129, set by Kentucky from 1943-55. Arizona won 81 straight games at Bear Down Gym from 1945-51, which remains the fifth-longest home-court streak in NCAA history.
