As Georgetown’s superstar center, Patrick Ewing won one NCAA championship game, in 1984, and lost two other finals — on Michael Jordan’s game-winning shot in 1982 and in an all-time upset to Villanova in 1985. Four decades later, Ewing is still so closely associated with March Madness that AT&T put him in an ad that will run throughout the tournament.
“Losing by one point to North Carolina, that was rough,” Ewing told NBC News. And the Villanova loss, “that’s still hard to even talk about.”
Ewing’s lone win came over Houston and star Hakeem Olajuwon. That season, Georgetown dealt with the death of Ewing’s mother, coach John Thompson’s mother and the mothers of two of Ewing’s teammates. “We had so [much] adversity that it was so great to achieve it, even with all those things going on,” he said.
Patrick Ewing and coach John Thompson hug after winning the national title. Anonymous / AP
A decade later, Olajuwon got revenge when he and the Houston Rockets beat Ewing and the New York Knicks for the NBA championship. After the game, did Olajuwon tell Ewing they were even now?
“Yes, he did,” Ewing said, laughing.