March Madness Comes Early This Year

Caitlin Clark pressing 'Pistol' Pete Maravich on the court.

Lately, there has been discussion about “Pistol” Pete Maravich, and his enduring NCAA basketball points scored record (3,667 points), set during his years at Louisiana State University (LSU) from 1967-1970.

That’s because his record is about to be broken (likely today), by Caitlin Clark, a basketball player on University of Iowa’s women’s basketball team.

Although comparison of the two stars’ exploits are complicated by the fact that men’s and women’s basketball games have differences (women’s jerseys button on the opposite side, I think), Maravich ended his collegiate career fifty-four years ago and he played a lot fewer games than Clark (83 games for Maravich vs. 128 for Clark thus far), one can’t argue with the results for both players: astounding!

Now, I don’t yet have a framed picture of Caitlin Clark on the court hanging in my office, as I do of Maravich (a colleague of mine has wondered out loud why I have a picture of a guy playing basketball in his underwear), but, as much as I admired Pete’s ability to drain jump shots and execute “no-look” passes, I chose to hang his picture in my office primarily because he was an iconoclast, whose droopy wool socks created such a cool look.

Maravich was treated with disdain by NCAA basketball purists back in the late 1960’s precisely because he was unique; he was derided as a “hot dog” on the court. He was Magic Johnson before Magic Johnson, expertly passing the ball to a teammate without looking at him, sometimes behind his back, or between his legs. And, he could shoot, averaging 44.2 points per game, before the advent of the three-point shot.

Pete went on to a respectable NBA career, registering nearly 16,000 points (LeBron James is currently the all-time points leader, standing just shy of 40,000 points).

Sadly, Pete died of a heart attack, while playing a pickup game of basketball in a church gym, at the age of forty.

I think it’s appropriate that we’re talking about the “Pistol” and Caitlin Clark, just having crossed the threshold into March - it’s madness, man! By the way, the only reference I could find to a nickname attached to Clark was, “Ponytail Pete” - c’mon, man, we can do better than that! In fact, I bet dedicated Rule of Three readers can offer vastly superior alternatives - feel free to provide them in the “Comments” section below, and the Rule of Three Moniker Team will vet them and report back at a later date (maybe. . .).

As for March Madness itself, get ready to strap in and enjoy a wild ride. There has been no clear-cut favorite during the regular season - NIL rewards and the transfer portal have yielded a good bit of parity amongst the 361 Division I contenders - there has been a revolving door attached to the Top 25 ranking lineup all season long, and, it’s anybody’s ballgame.

And, even though “One Shining Moment” will be blasting at the end of the Final Four championship game, while the winning team is cutting down the net, “Pistol” Pete Maravich, and his droopy wool socks will still be hanging on my office wall.

As easily as "Pistol" Pete Maravich could knock down a 20-foot jump shot, it's that easy for your to subscribe to Rule of Three: simply click the button below to subscribe now - it's free, man!