LSU Basketball

January 18

I am thankful for LSU basketball. Overall,they have not achieved the greatest success but I fondly remember Pete Maravich, who brought a new excitement for basketball to Louisiana; I remember the great games against Kentucky and watching Mike the Tiger being lowered down onto the floor from the ceiling; and I remember the first final four that LSU made after beating Arkansas and Wichita State in the Superdome in New Orleans. Those were the last games I ever attended with my father (I had given him the tickets as a birthday present). I am ever hopeful for a final four victory and a national championship one day. We'll see...

Pictured above is the Pete Maravich Assembly Center (PMAC) at LSU, where LSU plays its home basketball games. This is the so-called "House that Pete built".

pete maravich

wearing grey floppy socks

sporting a head of moppy hair

if you saw him on the street

nothing looked like an athlete there

but he could dribble and pass

like none other had done before

behind the back passes

two handed set shots and much more

the lines snaked out of the cow barn

through the parking lot with aplomb

waiting to get a  glimpse

of the daring jv phenom

and they left

through the turnstiles away

after the jv game

for the varsity they didn’t stay

the day he left lsu

on the record books at the top

pistol pete

went to the pros and didn’t stop

eventually time and tide

slowed him down

but he found a new master in god

an athlete of supreme renown

dribbles between legs

and slick behind the back passes

are the norm these days

but there is no confusing them with pete

who stood out among the masses.

© rt tulley