Some Thanksgiving “Cornbread” for Red Flash basketball fans: The win over Pitt was great, but not the greatest upset in St. Francis history: Beating a Final Four team in 1977 was

Cedric "Cornbread" Maxwell in 1977, though not at the Stokes Center

Cornbread was the 12th played selected in the 1977 NBA draft, first round, and played 11 seasons with the Boston Celtics, winning two NBA titles. 

While the St. Francis men’s basketball team’s win over the University of Pittsburgh on the Panthers home floor was a great win on Thanksgiving eve 2020, it was not the greatest upset in Red Flash history. 

That occurred at the Maurice Stokes Center in 1977 under Coach Pete Lonergan, and it included an opponent who became a star with the Boston Celtics. 

And it also included an off-the-court event that relegated that superb player to the locker room for the second half of that game. 

Victory over a Final Four team

The biggest upset victory, however, occurred at the Maurice Stokes Center in 1977. The victory was over North Carolina-Charlotte in 1977, 96-77, but few Red Flash fans that night in a packed facility realized the import of the victory at that time. 

Charlotte was led by Cedric (Cornbread) Maxwell, who later played for the Boston Celtics. Charlotte also reached the Final Four that year, and came within a point of advancing to the championship, so that win was a great one. 

I wrote about this last year and will post a little of that below. This post was one in which I explained how Jack Phelan’s 42-point game against Duquesne was the most exciting St. Francis game I ever witnessed,

Defeating Cornbread Maxwell

While the Duquesne game was the most exciting I have ever seen, the victory over the University of North Carolina-Charlotte a short time later was even more impressive. 

The reason was that Charlotte earned a spot in the NCAA Div. I Final Four later that season. Led by Cedric Maxwell, nicknamed Cornbread, Charlotte was very, very tough. However, the biggest play of the game occurred off the floor. 

At halftime, Maxwell and SF center Pat Sweeney became embroiled in a scuffle that turned into a fist-fight. I witnessed that also, and what occurred immediately after that gave the Flash a huge chance. 

Both Maxwell and Sweeney were ejected by the officials. That favored the Flash since Maxwell was a huge star while Sweeney was just a good player, their 6-8 center, but someone not in a league with Maxwell who became a first-round pick and a star with the Boston Celtics after leaving Charlotte. 

The Red Flash went on in the second half to win that game, 96-87, so Phelan was part of two of the biggest wins in SF history under Coach Lonergan.

UNC-Charlotte in the Final Four

Charlotte was a surprise in the Final Four, but was hardly a March Madness “Cinderella.” In fact, the Forty Niners almost made the finals an all-North Carolina affair because the Tar Heels had knocked off Jerry Tarkanian’s UNLV team by one point in the semifinals.

However, Charlotte had run past Central Michigan before posting impressive wins in the Mideast Region over Syracuse and Michigan. 

However, Marquette edged past the Forty Niners, 51-49, to advance to face the Tar Heels, whom they they defeated 67-59. That was Marquette’s first NCAA title and McGuire’s final game as their coach.

Charlotte lost to UNLV in the third-place game that is no longer played, but it ended a superb season for the Forty Niners. 

And, for Red Flash fans, it marked the only time that St. Francis had knocked off a team that advanced to the Final Four. 

In the Maurice Stokes years when the NIT was the huge tournament, the Red Flash won some key games to advance to the Final Four itself, losing a heartbreaker to Duquesne to prevent them from reaching the finals. 

Never, however, did they knock off an NCAA Final Four team.

Conclusion

My friend Art Martynuska used to laugh about the Sweeney-Cornbread confrontation. We talked about that often prior to his passing in 2006. He was an assistant coach to Coach Longergan in 1977, and he said that Sweeney and Maxwelll had been going after one another under the bucket the entire first half. 

Sweeney was tall and skinny, and you could tell that he never spent any time in the weight room, while Cornbread was a superbly-sculpted athlete. Nevertheless, Pat went after him and both landed a few blows before coaches and officials broke it up before they reached the locker rooms for halftime. 

Art said facetiously that he told Sweeney that his greatest contribution to the team was taking down Cornbread, and Pat, who I think was student teaching at St. Aloysius school in Cresson at the time, smiled in his sheepish way and laughed. 

He knew that Art was right. If Cornbread stays in the game, the Forty Niners will probably win.