Bobby Hauck, bucket lists and Game 2

So, you're at the All England Club on a future July date -- you know, when sports, like the Wimbledon Championships, are actually being played -- and in that urbane setting you spot Bobby Hauck strolling the grounds, Pimm's Cup in hand, dressed in his finest whites, head to shoes.

Can you picture it? Yeah, neither can we.

Dude loves those special days when he's alone on a quiet Montana river, fly rod in hand, a close friend or two nearby, but hushed silence at a major sporting event?

It doesn't fit, not for the guy who leads his team out onto the field a half dozen times every fall under the deafening din at Washington-Grizzly Stadium and probably still gets goosebumps, even after all these years.

The Griz football coach was talking about bucket lists and sports this week and mentioned Wimbledon, though it wasn't clear if he was talking about his sports bucket list or a general sports bucket list. We're going to assume the latter.

"When you're a sports fan, you have some things you want to do and see before you get to the end of it, whether it's the Indy 500 or the Kentucky Derby or the Masters or Wimbledon," he said.

The Indy 500? We can see it, especially if he's close enough to the track to smell the burning rubber. Feels like he'd be into the adrenaline. Maybe get him on a pit crew. The Kentucky Derby? Maybe for the two minutes of thunder but the all-day pre-party? That can't possibly be his scene.

The Masters? Oh yeah, that fits. No cell phones allowed? No cameras? The serene feel of being on the water combined with up-close-and-personal proximity to the best in the world at what they do, on hallowed grounds, without the uppityness of Wimbledon? That would totally be his thing.

"Certainly the World Series and Super Bowl need to be included," he continues. The former? He's usually pretty busy in late October. The latter? Done, checked off two years ago when he traveled to Minneapolis for Super Bowl LII, when his brother Tim was reaching the pinnacle with the Eagles.

"To get the chance to see (an NBA) Finals game was a great opportunity," says Hauck, who was at America West Arena on Friday night, June 11, 1993, for Game 2 between Chicago and Phoenix.

Years ago Hauck said it was one of the most memorable sporting events he's ever attended as a fan. That memory came to the surface on Sunday night, when that six-game series, between Michael Jordan's Bulls and Charles Barkley's Suns, was highlighted on episode 6 of ESPN's "The Last Dance."

He was new to the area, having just started his first fulltime coaching job at Northern Arizona, leading the special teams and safeties under Steve Axman after previously working as a graduate assistant at UCLA.

He's vague about the source of the ticket. "Small-town Montana connection," he says, which makes the story of how he was one of the 19,023 in attendance that evening even more intriguing.

It was Jordan's ninth year in the NBA and the Bulls were going for a threepeat. But for so many of us of a certain age, our viewing attraction for Jordan's on-court exploits pre-dated his time in Chicago. He was must-see TV whenever North Carolina came on our cable-less televisions in the early 80s.

He was so rarely seen outside of a game of the week that it made him and the Tar Heels even more alluring and appointment-setting.

"I was always a big Jordan fan. Tim and I used to watch when we were kids. If North Carolina was on, we stopped and watched, so I followed him for many years," says Hauck. "To get the opportunity to watch him play at probably the peak of his career was special."

It was after Game 2 of the '93 Finals, won 111-108 by Chicago, with Jordan going for 42 points, 12 rebounds and nine assists, that Barkley, who also scored 42 points, said, "I played as well as I could play, and Michael just outplayed me.

"That was probably the first time in my life that I felt like there was a better basketball player than me."

To go to a Finals game: nice. To go to a hotly contested Finals game when upper levels of greatness are reached by one of the best to ever play the game, someone you've followed for more than a decade, a performance acknowledged by another star: as good as it gets.

"He was just great. Phenomenal. I was a big fan. It was fun to see him live. For it to be in the Finals made it even better," Hauck said.

The win gave Chicago a 2-0 lead. Phoenix would take two of three at the old Chicago Stadium to get the series back to the desert, but the Bulls would close it out in six on John Paxson's game-winning 3-pointer in the closing seconds.

In Flagstaff, Hauck watched and approved, one line on his own list scratched off.

University of Montana Athletics

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