Duke vs. Kentucky, 1992 East Regional final, on ESPN Classic now

I can not watch this... I will not watch Brian Davis prance into Christian's arms ever again

 

Always forgotten from this game was that shot Woods made to give Kentucky the lead. My God was that an ugly, tough, clutch shot.

 

I've never forgotten it.

And yes, it was ugly, tough and clutch.

 

Wasn't it his final game as UK's announcer?

 

Yes.

 

Mentioning Ledford gives me an excuse to post the ending to Alexander Wolff's story about the game (several months later) in Sports Illustrated, which is one of my favorite stories ever:

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Young athletes are normally ingenuous in outlook and laconic in speech. They tend to prefer the security of cliche and to decline invitations to reflect. But singular circumstances can sometimes fit them with the perspective of those much older. Thirty years from now people will still be walking into the insurance agency Richie Farmer intends to open in Manchester, Ky., and asking him to tell them about that game the Unforgettables played against Duke back in '92. And Farmer will launch into the tale he already has down pat. "You know," he says today, and most surely will say tomorrow, "they say Cawood Ledford is the best recruiter Kentucky's ever had. Listening to Cawood call a loss, you can imagine a tear running down a little boy's cheek, and his mama going over to tell him it'll be all right, and the next day him going out and shooting baskets, because someday he's going to be a Wildcat and it's going to be different. That next time Kentucky's going to win."

Nine days after Duke's win in Philadelphia, Cawood Ledford was in Minneapolis to broadcast, as he customarily did, the Monday-night title game for NCAA Productions. Ledford was packing up his gear following Duke's victory over Michigan when a well-wisher came by to inquire how his final broadcast had gone.

Ledford barely looked up as he answered. "I did my last game a week ago."

 

Excellent. I'm just lucky I moved to Kentucky three months before that game, so I got to experience Cawood at least a couple times.

 

As good as Cawood was calling football and basketball, he was at his best calling a horse race.

No slight to Paul Rogers, who does a great job calling races, but I'll never hear anyone better than Mr. Ledford.

 

And how do they not T-up Laettner for stomping on a Kentucky player's chest? Lousy non-call there.

 

Now that is funny.

So ... how'd the ending turn out this time?

 

Laettner did get a technical. He just wasn't ejected.