With the NCAA tournament starting next week, the rest of America will almost certainly get its chance to see Hardaway too. Last week against St. Louis University, he gave a preview-and new meaning to the phrase full-court basketball. He jumped center, then set up as point guard before swinging over to forward, where he was equally adept shooting from three-point range and crashing the boards. In all, he scored 31 points, on only 12 shots in a 75-72 Memphis State victory. “He’s the best I’ve seen,” says St. Louis coach Charlie Spoonhour. “And, he seems like a nice young man.”
Called Penny since he was a boy, Hardaway will be worth millions if he skips his senior year and turns pro. After a star-studded National Basketball Association draft last year, the class of ‘93 is weak. Three underclassmen-Hardaway, Kentucky’s Jamal Mashburn, who has already announced he’ll leave school, and Michigan sophomore Chris Webber-could very well be the first players chosen.
Memphis State fans, sensing the impending loss of their superstar, began chanting “one more year” at the end of the St. Louis game. While Hardaway won’t make a decision until the season ends, he does drop a few hints. Raised by his grandmother in a poor Memphis inner-city neighborhood, he says he wants his grandmother and mother to have “the finer things in life. They did so much for me and I want to repay them.” For one thing, they taught him discipline. If he wasn’t in school or playing basketball, he was expected to be home. The streets were just too dangerous.
They still are. Two years ago he was robbed at gunpoint while visiting a cousin. As the assailants fled, one fired a shot. The bullet ricocheted and struck Hardaway in the foot. It took six months before the bullet shifted to a spot between Hardaway’s toes so doctors could remove it without damaging his foot.
Hardaway has rebounded from that scare and every other setback at Memphis State, too. He was embarrassed when he had to sit out his freshman year after failing to meet minimum test standards. “People looked at me like I was dumb,” says the secondary-education major. He now boasts the team’s highest grade-point average and even made the dean’s list last semester. Similarly, Hardaway works to improve on court. “I know I’m not going to be perfect,” he says, “but I want to be almost perfect.”
It will take almost perfect play for Memphis State to make a long run in the NCAA tournament. Going in, there is no clear favorite. Already this season six teams-North Carolina, Indiana, Duke, Michigan, Kansas and Kentucky-have been ranked No. 1. For the moment, the focus isn’t even on Duke’s efforts to win its third straight national title. Even with senior guard Bobby Hurley still directing the offense, the team has slumped, losing five games in its own conference. Duke may only be the second (or third) best team in its own state. So March madness, as the NCAA announcers like to call it, is ripe for a new story line and a new hero. The setting is right-the Final Four will be played in New Orleans’s Superdome. All Hardaway has to do is get there.
