Memphis State: Quite a Commitment
Memphis State: quite a commitment By Zack McMillin Sunday, March 30, 2003 Larry Finch could flat shoot the cover off a basketball. Dirty Red, as they called him over in Orange Mound, had hands strong as a bricklayer's, a barrel chest and arms built sturdy in the old- fashioned way, by play and by work and by nature. Nobody ever accused him of explosive leaping ability, but Finch could hover longer than one might imagine. Because of his strength and his gift for judging trajectory, every time Larry Finch took a shot, it had a chance. "He put more spin on the ball," says Larry Kenon, one of his famous teammates, "than anybody I ever played with." So when Ronnie Robinson tipped the ball to him on the late fall evening of Dec. 1, 1970, Finch took four dribbles, eyed the basket 25 feet away, rose up, pointed his right elbow at the rim and loaded the basketball with backspin. History does not tell us if the 7,123 at the Mid-South Coliseum that night made like a Melrose crowd and let out a collective "whoosh!" when Finch shot. Newspaper accounts do tell us what happened next. The ball ripped into the cotton netting, and the Coliseum exploded with joy that had been bottled up too long. Six seconds into his first varsity game for the Memphis State Tigers basketball team, Larry Finch had the first two points of a career that would produce 1,869 points in only three seasons. He finished with 24 that night against California-Davis, and, in the first game for charismatic new coach Gene Bartow, the Tigers scored more points -- 99 -- than they had in any game of the previous five seasons.
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