Wild About '88: The Rise of Arizona Basketball. Chapter 4: The Great Alaska Shootout vs. Duquense
This season marks the 35th anniversary of one of Tucson’s most beloved teams of all time, the 1987-88 Arizona Wildcats that finished 35-3 and went to the program’s first Final Four. We will celebrate that team by recapping each game during that unforgettable season by referencing newspaper archives and interviews conducted during the making of the upcoming documentary film ‘Wild About ‘88: The Rise of Arizona Basketball.’
November 27, 1987
The Great Alaska Shootout First Round vs. Duquense
Arizona started its 1987-88 quest far from home in a prestigious basketball event in the Last Frontier.
The Great Alaska Shootout was celebrating its 10th anniversary that season. In its first decade of existence basketball powers Kentucky, North Carolina, and Louisville were a few of the teams that came away as champions from the Anchorage tournament.
This tourney may have had big-time basketball schools but the accommodations were a little different than what players were used to.
“You just didn't all go up to Alaska and pull into a Marriott or something. You ended up getting with a local family and staying with them,” Jud Buechler said in 2016.
“I remember we all ate at different families’ houses for Thanksgiving,” Matt Muehlebach said in 2015. “I remember Sean Elliott coming back laughing because he ate at the Sizzler, and my roommate and I ate at somebody's house and they had moose for dinner.”
No. 17 Arizona was hoping for early tests with Michigan and Syracuse. But first, they had to take care of business against the Duquense Dukes in the first round.
Muehlebach recalled the teams sharing an elevator in Alaska. “We were with players from Duquesne and you know, players always look good. You call them airport players. They were big, they were tall. They looked like a good college team.”
But this Duquense squad did not have TJ McConnell.
“Duquesne was just a bloodbath. I mean, good grief, we just couldn't miss a shot,” Tom Tolbert said in 2016
Arizona scored on 20 of its first 22 possessions and shot 63% as a team from the field and 58% from the three-point line.
“Even the guys that were coming in off the bench were hitting shots. Lute was almost embarrassed at that point,” Tolbert added.
The reserves played almost as much as the starters in Arizona’s 133-78 shellacking. Kenny Lofton and Jud Buechler both scored 17 points a piece coming off the bench.
“I hate to get involved in games like this,” Olson said. “I was really hoping we wouldn’t shoot it as well in the final 10 minutes. But it didn’t seem to matter who was shooting”1
The 133 points are still a school record for points scored in a game. The 54 field goals Arizona made that night also have not been touched.
Elliott would lead all scorers with 26 points in just 21 minutes.
Arizona’s victory would get them a matchup in the semifinals with one of Olson’s Big-10 rivals from his Iowa days. Olson and Arizona fans had no clue this competitor would become a future likable adversary in Tempe.
Next Up: November 28 vs. No. 9 Michigan
Blog content and original interview quotations © Waterfoot Films 2022.
Jack Rickard, “Cats loaded up and ready,” The Tucson Citizen, November 28 1987, Page One—Section B.; Jay Gonzalaes, “Competition makes Alaska tourney a hotbed for basketball,” The Arizona Daily Star, November 25 1987, Page One and Three—Section C.
Jack Rickard, “Cats loaded up and ready,” The Tucson Citizen, November 28 1987, Page One—Section B.