University of St. Thomas Athletics
Gene’s Blog: It never gets old celebrating the Toms’ good old days
1/26/2024 12:17:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Most college hoops fans know the song. Few know the back story.
Most college hoops fans know the song. Few know the back story.
"One Shining Moment" has been called one of the more recognizable jingles in sports, in the same tier as "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" or the Olympics Games musical theme.
The basketball song debuted in 1987 on CBS-TV at the conclusion of that winter's NCAA men's tournament. Nearly four decades later, it's still going strong.
David Barrett was in 1986 considered a poor man's Billy Joel. A musician, songwriter and bar singer, Barrett had just played a gig in East Lansing, Mich., at the Varsity Inn, a small watering hole not far from the Michigan State University campus.
As he sipped on a beer, Barrett watched an NBA game on the bar's TV screen. Larry Bird was making it look so easy with his Hall of Fame flair, and Barrett's adrenaline was flowing. He was trying to explain to a waitress what he called the "poetry of basketball." Barrett eventually reached for a bar napkin and wrote down three words that were floating in his brain: One Shining Moment.
The next day Barrett rode another burst of energy and cranked out a 162-word song. It highlighted those special opportunities in basketball when everything is on the line and one team can experience its shining moment. He worked his piano keys for a couple of hours and created the song's melody to cap a productive day.
Barrett shared his creation with an old high school pal, a prominent sportswriter who also had contacts at CBS. Barrett was pleasantly surprised weeks later when he received a call from the network — he was told that CBS loved his creation and planned to use it on its upcoming Super Bowl telecast. Although his work didn't make the cut for the Super Bowl, it was used instead as a recap montage song at the end of the 1987 March Madness title game. The viewers loved it… and an American hoops and pop culture tradition was born.
Shining Memories
If David Barrett ever comes to St. Paul to write a song about the history of Tommie basketball, he would have plenty of good storylines and characters to study.
He could play off the underdog theme in the Purple's latest athletics chapter. The university made history back in 2021-22 by moving up all its sports from Division III to D-I in one season. The Toms continue to exceed expectations over these first three seasons.
But Barrett would love hearing about many of those special teams of the past. Those teams laid the foundation to more elite D-III finishes and were a springboard for St. Thomas into its current D-I chapter.
He'd appreciate that three different UST women's or men's hoops teams produced one of those rare "One Shining Moment" celebrations in the NCAA Division III winners' circle. Tommie players representing 1990-91 WBB and 2010-11 and 2015-16 MBB won national titles. They were the last ones standing out of 400-plus basketball teams.
He'd notice St. Thomas' unusual continuity in leadership, and that has made for a true family vibe over the decades. Our MBB teams have had just three head coaches over the last 70 years, while our WBB teams have had only three head coaches over their last 40 seasons.
Since 1986, Tommie MBB has won 740 games (averaging above 21 per season) at a .737 win percentage. They have had just two losing seasons since Jimmy Carter was President (and one was in its D-I debut year).
And over the last 40 years, Tommie WBB has posted 836 victories (averaging above 21 per season) so far with a .760 win percentage, finishing with losing records only four times (none in their last 15 Division III seasons).
We'd tell Barrett that all six of those head coaches – Tom Feely, Steve Fritz, Johnny Tauer, Ted Riverso, Tricia Dornisch, and Ruth Sinn – graduated from St. Thomas. Four of them played for the program's previous head coach in their own careers.
We'd remind him that Fritz' 31-year head coaching era produced 594 wins and included a 153-23 record over his final six seasons.
It's the Little Things
If Barrett pored through old St. Thomas game films, wouldn't find an individual star like Larry Bird (there's only one Larry Legend). He might not see consistent poetry on the court, either. Although it is a fact that Fritz' 1997-98 team did defeat Whittier College -- a team whose school nickname is, ahem, the Poets.
But the Michigan songwriter could find a common thread among past and present St. Thomas players: men and women that put the team first; that share the ball; that value each possession; that make the extra pass; that understand the value of defense; that bring game-night energy in practice; and that embrace the tradition built by past Tommie teams.
Two of those memorable Purple men's hoops teams were invited back to campus this month to be honored. Recently celebrated was the 2008-09 squad that reached the national playoff quarterfinals en route to a 30-1 finish. And this Saturday night the Toms' 1993-94 Final Four team will be recognized at the men's game at the new Schoenecker.
Here's a quick look back at those two fun basketball teams:
1993-94 Tommies
St. Thomas (24-7, 18-2 MIAC) became the first MIAC men's team to reach a Final Four in the post NAIA era. The Toms went 5-0 to start the postseason (conference and early NCAA playoffs) to reach the national semifinals in New York, where they lost in the semifinals and again in the third-place game.
After a 1-3 start, St. Thomas reeled off wins in 23 of its next 25 games, including an 18-2 burst to claim the conference title. They were just the second Tommie men's team to sweep the MIAC regular-season and playoff crowns in the 10-year history of the league's playoff format.
Current head coach Johnny Tauer was a junior forward on that balanced team that was led by senior Brent Longval. Then freshman Karnell James (1,854 points), Tauer (1,219) and Longval (1,119) were all eventual 1,000-point career scorers. Two of the better passers in program history were also on that team: juniors Matt McDonagh and Mike Bergan.
The Purple avenged two losses to St. John's with a 66-63 home win in the playoff championship clash. The 24 wins were the second most by a St. Thomas team in the previous 20 seasons.
(Most of that Tommie team returned in 1994-95 and led another excellent season that started with a 27-0 record before a season-ending loss to Nebraska Wesleyan in the NCAA playoffs. That group was the first MIAC men's team to sweep all 22 games against conference opponents.)
Tauer's Memories:
"I was fortunate to be on the 1993-94 team as a junior. That was a team that I thought was incredibly unselfish, balanced. We played really up tempo, probably the fastest we had ever played both in terms of full-court pressure and depth. In many ways it's the vision of how I love our teams to play still today.
"To this day many of those guys are my closest friends, it was a special group of guys led by the veterans, just a group of guys that all got along well and took care of the ball. Coach Fritz did an unbelievable job. Assistants Bill McKee and Dan Brink ran our offense and defense. Just a group of guys that understood their roles and loved competing with one another.
"In the NCAA playoffs we hosted the Sweet 16 round on our home floor in a magical weekend, and we beat Hampden-Sydney and Greensboro, two of the best teams in the country. We had a busload of students that went out to Buffalo, N.Y., took an 18-hour bus ride to the Final Four. When you think of the student-athlete experience, it's not just being on a successful team and part of a lot of victories, but also the relationships and the fond memories that we will always carry with us."
2008-09 Tommies
This team broke the 1994-95 team's school record win streak (27) as it started the season 30-0 before falling to eventual national champion Washington (Mo.) in the national quarterfinals. This was the year that several top-10 ranked teams hailed from Wisconsin, Missouri, Illinois and Minnesota, and their postseason assignment to reach the Final Four was dubbed the "Bracket of Death" by the staff at D3hoops.com as four or five teams in that side of the bracket were considered NCAA champion caliber squads.
Those 2008-09 Toms were the last team to play in the old Schoenecker Arena as it was tore down the next summer for construction of the Anderson Athletic and Recreation Complex.
Senior Lonnie Robinson was a four-year contributor and also was a standout as an All-America honoree in baseball as a pitcher. Senior B.J. Viau was another key leader and contributor. Junior Joe Scott and sophomore Tyler Nicolai were eventual 1,000-point career scorers, and Teddy Archer was a defensive ace. (Nicolai, Alex Healy, and Anders Halvorsen would later help lead the 2010-11 Toms win the national championship).
Tauer's Memories:
"Our 2008-09 team that we honored a couple of weeks ago won its first 30 games that winter. Both the 1994 and 2009 teams exhibited a very similar style as far as playing up-tempo and relying on a pressure defense.
"We had four unbelievable seniors in Al McCoy, B.J. View, Brett Tuma and Lonnie Robinson. Each of those guys contributed in so many ways. Joe Scott was the MVP of the conference and Tyler Nicolai went on to become an All-American.
"It was a team of guys that bought into not scoring as much, or not playing as many minutes because we used 11 guys. We broke the school record for shooting percentage in part because our defense that created turnovers and produced so many high-percentage baskets.
"We played the final game in the old Schoenecker Arena. We were ranked first in the country and Stevens Point was No. 4. It should have been a Final Four game, but it was a Round of 32 game due to the way they did the brackets, mostly on geography. We beat them in a slugfest game that went down to the final seconds.
"We ended up losing in the national quarterfinals to Washington University, the defending NCAA champ, in a really tough battle. We were up big in the first half, but they pulled away in the second half. Their coach sent us a nice note after the game and said we were the best team they had faced, and they rolled through the Final Four to win the championship after they beat us.
"Both that 1994 and 2009 team had senior leaders, depth, the leadership of Coach Fritz and just overall displayed the pillars of our program still today with a toughness and unselfish play. I'm just very proud to have been part of both of those teams, and we're thrilled that we are able to honor both of them this year."
--
Gene's Blog is written by Gene McGivern, who retired in August 2023 after a 35-year career as a college sports information director, including his last 29 years at St. Thomas. Gene contributes occasional stories on Tommiesports.com and assists with the university's Athletics Hall of Fame committee.
You can reach Gene at genemcgivern58@gmail.com.
Follow Along
For more information on St. Thomas Men's Basketball, follow along on X at @TommieMBBall and on Instagram at @tommiehoops
Join Us
To reserve your seat to be a part of the Tommies' 2023-24 season, click HERE to view ticketing information and purchase options.
-- St. Thomas Athletics --
"One Shining Moment" has been called one of the more recognizable jingles in sports, in the same tier as "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" or the Olympics Games musical theme.
The basketball song debuted in 1987 on CBS-TV at the conclusion of that winter's NCAA men's tournament. Nearly four decades later, it's still going strong.
David Barrett was in 1986 considered a poor man's Billy Joel. A musician, songwriter and bar singer, Barrett had just played a gig in East Lansing, Mich., at the Varsity Inn, a small watering hole not far from the Michigan State University campus.
As he sipped on a beer, Barrett watched an NBA game on the bar's TV screen. Larry Bird was making it look so easy with his Hall of Fame flair, and Barrett's adrenaline was flowing. He was trying to explain to a waitress what he called the "poetry of basketball." Barrett eventually reached for a bar napkin and wrote down three words that were floating in his brain: One Shining Moment.
The next day Barrett rode another burst of energy and cranked out a 162-word song. It highlighted those special opportunities in basketball when everything is on the line and one team can experience its shining moment. He worked his piano keys for a couple of hours and created the song's melody to cap a productive day.
Barrett shared his creation with an old high school pal, a prominent sportswriter who also had contacts at CBS. Barrett was pleasantly surprised weeks later when he received a call from the network — he was told that CBS loved his creation and planned to use it on its upcoming Super Bowl telecast. Although his work didn't make the cut for the Super Bowl, it was used instead as a recap montage song at the end of the 1987 March Madness title game. The viewers loved it… and an American hoops and pop culture tradition was born.
Shining Memories
If David Barrett ever comes to St. Paul to write a song about the history of Tommie basketball, he would have plenty of good storylines and characters to study.
He could play off the underdog theme in the Purple's latest athletics chapter. The university made history back in 2021-22 by moving up all its sports from Division III to D-I in one season. The Toms continue to exceed expectations over these first three seasons.
But Barrett would love hearing about many of those special teams of the past. Those teams laid the foundation to more elite D-III finishes and were a springboard for St. Thomas into its current D-I chapter.
He'd appreciate that three different UST women's or men's hoops teams produced one of those rare "One Shining Moment" celebrations in the NCAA Division III winners' circle. Tommie players representing 1990-91 WBB and 2010-11 and 2015-16 MBB won national titles. They were the last ones standing out of 400-plus basketball teams.
He'd notice St. Thomas' unusual continuity in leadership, and that has made for a true family vibe over the decades. Our MBB teams have had just three head coaches over the last 70 years, while our WBB teams have had only three head coaches over their last 40 seasons.
Since 1986, Tommie MBB has won 740 games (averaging above 21 per season) at a .737 win percentage. They have had just two losing seasons since Jimmy Carter was President (and one was in its D-I debut year).
And over the last 40 years, Tommie WBB has posted 836 victories (averaging above 21 per season) so far with a .760 win percentage, finishing with losing records only four times (none in their last 15 Division III seasons).
We'd tell Barrett that all six of those head coaches – Tom Feely, Steve Fritz, Johnny Tauer, Ted Riverso, Tricia Dornisch, and Ruth Sinn – graduated from St. Thomas. Four of them played for the program's previous head coach in their own careers.
We'd remind him that Fritz' 31-year head coaching era produced 594 wins and included a 153-23 record over his final six seasons.
It's the Little Things
If Barrett pored through old St. Thomas game films, wouldn't find an individual star like Larry Bird (there's only one Larry Legend). He might not see consistent poetry on the court, either. Although it is a fact that Fritz' 1997-98 team did defeat Whittier College -- a team whose school nickname is, ahem, the Poets.
But the Michigan songwriter could find a common thread among past and present St. Thomas players: men and women that put the team first; that share the ball; that value each possession; that make the extra pass; that understand the value of defense; that bring game-night energy in practice; and that embrace the tradition built by past Tommie teams.
Two of those memorable Purple men's hoops teams were invited back to campus this month to be honored. Recently celebrated was the 2008-09 squad that reached the national playoff quarterfinals en route to a 30-1 finish. And this Saturday night the Toms' 1993-94 Final Four team will be recognized at the men's game at the new Schoenecker.
Here's a quick look back at those two fun basketball teams:
1993-94 Tommies
St. Thomas (24-7, 18-2 MIAC) became the first MIAC men's team to reach a Final Four in the post NAIA era. The Toms went 5-0 to start the postseason (conference and early NCAA playoffs) to reach the national semifinals in New York, where they lost in the semifinals and again in the third-place game.
After a 1-3 start, St. Thomas reeled off wins in 23 of its next 25 games, including an 18-2 burst to claim the conference title. They were just the second Tommie men's team to sweep the MIAC regular-season and playoff crowns in the 10-year history of the league's playoff format. Current head coach Johnny Tauer was a junior forward on that balanced team that was led by senior Brent Longval. Then freshman Karnell James (1,854 points), Tauer (1,219) and Longval (1,119) were all eventual 1,000-point career scorers. Two of the better passers in program history were also on that team: juniors Matt McDonagh and Mike Bergan.
The Purple avenged two losses to St. John's with a 66-63 home win in the playoff championship clash. The 24 wins were the second most by a St. Thomas team in the previous 20 seasons.
(Most of that Tommie team returned in 1994-95 and led another excellent season that started with a 27-0 record before a season-ending loss to Nebraska Wesleyan in the NCAA playoffs. That group was the first MIAC men's team to sweep all 22 games against conference opponents.)
Tauer's Memories:
"I was fortunate to be on the 1993-94 team as a junior. That was a team that I thought was incredibly unselfish, balanced. We played really up tempo, probably the fastest we had ever played both in terms of full-court pressure and depth. In many ways it's the vision of how I love our teams to play still today.
"To this day many of those guys are my closest friends, it was a special group of guys led by the veterans, just a group of guys that all got along well and took care of the ball. Coach Fritz did an unbelievable job. Assistants Bill McKee and Dan Brink ran our offense and defense. Just a group of guys that understood their roles and loved competing with one another.
"In the NCAA playoffs we hosted the Sweet 16 round on our home floor in a magical weekend, and we beat Hampden-Sydney and Greensboro, two of the best teams in the country. We had a busload of students that went out to Buffalo, N.Y., took an 18-hour bus ride to the Final Four. When you think of the student-athlete experience, it's not just being on a successful team and part of a lot of victories, but also the relationships and the fond memories that we will always carry with us."
2008-09 Tommies
This team broke the 1994-95 team's school record win streak (27) as it started the season 30-0 before falling to eventual national champion Washington (Mo.) in the national quarterfinals. This was the year that several top-10 ranked teams hailed from Wisconsin, Missouri, Illinois and Minnesota, and their postseason assignment to reach the Final Four was dubbed the "Bracket of Death" by the staff at D3hoops.com as four or five teams in that side of the bracket were considered NCAA champion caliber squads.
Those 2008-09 Toms were the last team to play in the old Schoenecker Arena as it was tore down the next summer for construction of the Anderson Athletic and Recreation Complex.Senior Lonnie Robinson was a four-year contributor and also was a standout as an All-America honoree in baseball as a pitcher. Senior B.J. Viau was another key leader and contributor. Junior Joe Scott and sophomore Tyler Nicolai were eventual 1,000-point career scorers, and Teddy Archer was a defensive ace. (Nicolai, Alex Healy, and Anders Halvorsen would later help lead the 2010-11 Toms win the national championship).
Tauer's Memories:
"Our 2008-09 team that we honored a couple of weeks ago won its first 30 games that winter. Both the 1994 and 2009 teams exhibited a very similar style as far as playing up-tempo and relying on a pressure defense.
"We had four unbelievable seniors in Al McCoy, B.J. View, Brett Tuma and Lonnie Robinson. Each of those guys contributed in so many ways. Joe Scott was the MVP of the conference and Tyler Nicolai went on to become an All-American.
"It was a team of guys that bought into not scoring as much, or not playing as many minutes because we used 11 guys. We broke the school record for shooting percentage in part because our defense that created turnovers and produced so many high-percentage baskets.
"We played the final game in the old Schoenecker Arena. We were ranked first in the country and Stevens Point was No. 4. It should have been a Final Four game, but it was a Round of 32 game due to the way they did the brackets, mostly on geography. We beat them in a slugfest game that went down to the final seconds.
"We ended up losing in the national quarterfinals to Washington University, the defending NCAA champ, in a really tough battle. We were up big in the first half, but they pulled away in the second half. Their coach sent us a nice note after the game and said we were the best team they had faced, and they rolled through the Final Four to win the championship after they beat us.
"Both that 1994 and 2009 team had senior leaders, depth, the leadership of Coach Fritz and just overall displayed the pillars of our program still today with a toughness and unselfish play. I'm just very proud to have been part of both of those teams, and we're thrilled that we are able to honor both of them this year."
--
Gene's Blog is written by Gene McGivern, who retired in August 2023 after a 35-year career as a college sports information director, including his last 29 years at St. Thomas. Gene contributes occasional stories on Tommiesports.com and assists with the university's Athletics Hall of Fame committee.
You can reach Gene at genemcgivern58@gmail.com.
Follow Along
For more information on St. Thomas Men's Basketball, follow along on X at @TommieMBBall and on Instagram at @tommiehoops
Join Us
To reserve your seat to be a part of the Tommies' 2023-24 season, click HERE to view ticketing information and purchase options.
-- St. Thomas Athletics --
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