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When March Went Mad: The Game That Transformed Basketball |  | Author: Seth Davis
Publisher: Holt Paperbacks
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
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Rating:  63 reviews
Sales Rank: 222103
Media: Paperback
Edition: First Edition
Pages: 352
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8 x 5.2 x 1
ISBN: 0805091513
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.323630973
EAN: 9780805091519
ASIN: 0805091513
Publication Date: February 2, 2010
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
“A must-read for anybody who considers themselves a basketball fan.”—Michael Wilbon, The Washington Post On March 26, 1979, basketball as we know it was born. The NCAA championship game played that day launched an epic rivalry between two exceptional players: Earvin “Magic” Johnson and Larry Bird. Though they played each other only once as college athletes, that game transformed the NCAA tournament into a multibillion-dollar enterprise and laid the foundation for the resurgence of the NBA. To this day it remains the highest-rated basketball game, college or pro, in the history of television. In the national bestseller When March Went Mad, Seth Davis recounts the dramatic story of the season leading up to that game, as Johnson’s Michigan State Spartans and Bird’s Indiana State Sycamores overcame long odds and great doubts to reach the game’s grandest stage. Davis also tells the stories of their remarkable coaches, Jud Heathcote and Bill Hodges, and he shows how tensions over race and class heightened the drama of the competition. Davis combed through several years’ worth of newspaper and magazine coverage, interviewed nearly one hundred people, and watched dozens of games to reconstruct the colorful, historic, and improbable narrative of how Larry Bird and Magic Johnson burst on the scene—a coming-of-age story that continues to resonate. The Final Four, the NBA, and the game of basketball have never been the same.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 63
 Fun trip down memory lane June 3, 2010
Avid Reader (USA)
I was in high school when Magic Johnson and Larry Bird burst on the national scene. I was a sports nut in those days (not so much today), and I played playground ball with my friends every day. I wasn't good enough to make my high school team, but basketball was a big part of my life regardless.
Magic and Bird, especially Magic, utterly transformed the games that we played. I remember vividly how everyone started trying to pass the ball with Magic's flair. All of a sudden, scoring wasn't as big a deal as delivering a perfect pass. We tried going behind the back, between our legs, bounce passes from half-court, and even lobbing to each other (which had to be exquisitely timed for kids who had vertical jumps of maybe 15 inches). We all dribbled less and passed more; we wanted to be Magic or Bird.
"When March Went Mad" does a decent job of chronicling what it was like to be a basketball fan in those days -- when the greatness of Magic or Bird was more a rumor than something that was visible on your TV, computer or handheld device all the time. We would read the articles about these guys, but it wasn't until we saw them that we understood -- really understood -- that they were different. And because we saw so little of them, it made those early glimpses even more memorable.
It was fun to relive those days, as well as to get the more raw inside stuff that the author has unearthed. He gives full coverage to the remarkable stories behind Magic, Bird (who quit Univ. Indiana and worked on a maintenance crew for a year before going to Indiana State), and their coaches (the volatile, mean Jud Heathcote and the rookie Bill Hodges).
Less successful is the author's repeated efforts to remind us how "small" big-time basketball was in the late 1970s. A few observations would have been enough, instead of the repetition used to pad the size of the book. Also, the idea that the NCAA championship game between the Magic's Michigan State Spartans and Bird's Indiana State Sycamores "changed" the game of basketball is an exaggeration. Bird's and Magic's sustained excellence in the NBA really did the trick, because that's where they took the top level of the game and made it better, more creative than it had been in a decade. College basketball was not transformed by Magic and Bird but by other factors that swept Magic and Bird along for a short period of time.
 A Lansingite's perspective February 22, 2010
Doctor Fresh
I was a sixth-grader in Lansing when this game was played. It was the biggest thing that's ever happened in my hometown. Before Magic Johnson came along, we were just a state capital. I totally agree that local pride pushed Magic Johnson toward Michigan State. My dad took me to see him play when he was still a high schooler at Everett. (I ended up going to the school Magic really wanted to attend: Sexton High.) With its profiles of other local heroes like Dr. Charles Tucker, Jay Vincent and George Fox, this book brought back those days. It also reminded me of how lucky Jud Heathcote got that year. If Magic had grown up in Flint, he would have attended Michigan. No one wanted to play for that crusty coach.
Although Davis did a great job of describing my hometown -- even better than Magic in his own autobiography -- as a Lansingite, I do have to point out a few errors. "Grand Ridge" should be Grand Ledge, "Troll Bridge Road" is Trowbridge Road, and Dwight Rich was a junior high school in those days, not a middle school.
 I love this book. September 25, 2009
Harold Harefoot (Tucson, AZ United States)
I didn't see the game - heard about it of course. This book lets you in on so much more than just the one game at the end of the season. It tells you how Magic ended up at MSU and how Bird came to be at Indiana State - it wasn't where he started college. It also gives you details about all of the teammates - some of whom, while mostly forgotten by history, were also pretty darned good basketball players. Neither Michigan State nor Indiana State, it turns out, were one man teams. This book takes you through all the important events leading up to the 1978-79 season and it takes you through the entire season. Some of the events and some of the games that occured before the final were as interesting, or more so, than the final game, so that information isn't just filler - not just stuff to take up space until you get to the main event - it's riveting reading. This book isn't a literary masterpiece, but it's a great read about a not-so-long-ago time when things were... different (I'd say better) in college basketball. These days, Bird and Magic would never meet in the championship because they both would already be in the NBA by this point in their careers - and that's a shame.
When Two Giants Collide July 16, 2009
Michael Barer (Seattle, WA)
Seth Davis does an excellent job of building up to one of sport's most defining moments-- Indiana State's Larry Bird, the shy country boy and Michigan State's Earvin "Magic" Johnson, the charismatic big city phenom met in the 1979 NCAA finals. Seth Davis did excellent research into the backgrounds of these two superstars. As well as the rocky road both their schools followed to get to the big game.
Bird and Johnson went on to become part of arguably the most storied rivalry in professional sports.
Great insights on Bird and Magic and Other Characters June 26, 2009
Robert Anderson (Titusville,FL)
As Diehard Spartan I thought I knew all there was to know about The Game.
Seth Davis did a great job making this more than just a sports book getting into the lives and character of not just Bird and Magic but many of the other characters that contributed to The Game That Made March Madness
Showing reviews 1-5 of 63
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