The 1992 MBB game vs UT. The best Rice MBB game ever IMHO and the most amazing home court advantage...the height of the Jungle Gym era.
Simply electrifying.

Also, first live game from Autry Court on main ESPN network, back when that was more of a big deal. I was there for that great moment in Rice History, sitting next to my bud from UT. He was very charitable about the outcome, and recognized that Rice at that time was a program on the ascent. Shame Thompson left before we could get to the NCAAs. Had he stayed long-term, things in basketball might well have turned out different for us and we might not be quite the also-rans we have become. All his assistants remain in coaching, but I don't believe he coached much after Cornell (I think he went to Wichita State first and did not do well there--his coaching story was never the same after he left Rice.)

(04-21-2020 10:51 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Also, first live game from Autry Court on main ESPN network, back when that was more of a big deal. I was there for that great moment in Rice History, sitting next to my bud from UT. He was very charitable about the outcome, and recognized that Rice at that time was a program on the ascent. Shame Thompson left before we could get to the NCAAs. Had he stayed long-term, things in basketball might well have turned out different for us and we might not be quite the also-rans we have become. All his assistants remain in coaching, but I don't believe he coached much after Cornell (I think he went to Wichita State first and did not do well there--his coaching story was never the same after he left Rice.)

Thompson stepped down due to a reoccurrence of cancer in 2000. He'd been diagnosed in the spring of 1999 with colon cancer and had it removed.

https://cornellsun.com/2000/08/23/thomps...ers-coach/

Overall record was not good. Two winning seasons at Rice, and his first season at Cornell had a winning record.

https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/coa...son-2.html

Never went back to coaching. But he's apparently been doing big things as a fundraiser for cancer centers. (from 2013)

https://qconline.com/news/local/moline-s...c6af1.html

And apparently has been dabbling as an radio analyst for college basketball. (from 2016)

https://tucson.com/saturdays-ua-hoops-ra...dea09.html

I remember when we hired Chris DelConte as AD. He was assistant/associate AD at Arizona and Scott was in some fundraising capacity there. One of the search committee called Scott to get a read on Chris. Scott's answer, "I know you can't hire him, because if we have any sense, we will pay him too much for him to leave."