Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series of looks back at the highlights of Durand “Rudy” Macklin’s career at LSU in preparation for his jersey retirement ceremony at halftime of the LSU-Kentucky game on Saturday at 3 p.m. at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
Monday we looked at his freshman year and today, his sophomore season. Later today, our web site will feature reactions from Macklin and Coach Dale Brown at a press conference.
Thursday the series resumes with a look at what would be two junior seasons and on Friday, a look at his final senior campaign that concluded with LSU reaching the NCAA Final Four.
SOPHOMORE YEAR (1977-78)
Rudy Macklin would led the team in scoring 18 times and in rebounds 15 times, but it was a game that he watched the end of from the bench that proved to be the crowning moment of Macklin’s sophomore year as the Tigers under Dale Brown took another step forward toward the top of the SEC and a potential NCAA tournament berth.
Macklin was a consensus first-team All-SEC selection in 1978 (the only sophomore on the All-SEC team) and was a Basketball Weekly second-team All-America. His 19.0 scoring average was fifth best in the SEC … He hit 62 percent from the field and averaged 10.6 rebounds per game … Included in his year was a five-game conference streak where he averaged 27.1 points and 12.1 rebounds … He was second in the league in rebounds and second in field goal percentage.
Thursday – Macklin’s Junior Seasons
A record crowd of 14,551 crammed into the LSU Assembly Center on Feb. 11, 1978 to watch the Tigers, 13-7 on the year, take on the No. 1-ranked Kentucky Wildcats.
Seven times since the Associated Press poll began in the late 1940s, the Tigers had played the No. 1 team with little results to show for it. Most of the time that No. 1 team was Kentucky. Earlier in the year, Kentucky had defeated LSU, 96-76, in a game more famous for Coach Brown’s post-game comments that the Wildcats “brutalized” the game.
So to say things were a little fired up going into the game, might be an understatement. Someone must have told the two officials it was going to be a physical game because fouls were being called right and left. In fact Kenny Higgs would start the parade of those fouling out with 18 minutes to go in the game. Macklin, with his mom and dad in from Kentucky to watch the game, scored a game-high 23 points for the Tigers but watched the last five minutes and overtime from the Tiger bench after fouling out. By the end of things, all five LSU starters had fouled out.
Of the game, won by LSU, 95-94, Dale Brown would say: “Kentucky refused to give up and we refused to let them win.”
Macklin said: “The key to the game was that we never lost our confidence – not a man on the team – and even though we had starters out on fouls – we didn’t lose confidence.”
Today, Macklin remembers the night of the game like this: “We had lost to the Wildcats in Lexington earlier that year as a result of foul trouble, and we knew that we did not play our best game. When Kentucky came to Baton Rouge as the No.1 team in the country, the entire basketball world smelled an upset. As for me, I had slowed the game down mentally. Everything I did, including my approach to the game the week before was in slow motion. I walked slower to a huddle. If I fell to the floor I got up slow. When shooting a free throw, I walked to line slowly. I got dressed slowly. I took my time getting off the bench after timeouts. And as always, I listened to my smooth contemporary jazz before the game. The entire approach helped calm me down. This approach worked. I went 11-for-12 from the field to lead all scorers; but more importantly, we beat the No. 1 team in the land.
On the horizon would be an historic season for LSU … one that Macklin would have to sit and watch. That story and his two junior seasons on Thursday as our series of Rudy Macklin’s year-by-year history at LSU continues.