Remembering Bill Walton and Bill Bradley, and celebrating Kaitlin Clark

This week marks the 50th anniversary of Bill Walton’s incredible performance in the NCAA basketball tournament’s championship game. Walton scored 44 points on 21 for 22 shooting to lead UCLA to victory over Memphis State. This was the most efficient and probably the most impressive performance in Final Four history.

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of watching what might be the most impressive performance in a women’s Final Four game. Kaitlin Clark of Iowa scored 41 points to lead her team to victory over South Carolina, the defending champions who were riding a 42 game winning streak.

Clark added eight assists and six rebounds. She scored nearly all of Iowa’s 18 points in the fourth quarter and assisted on the rest of them.

Clark’s performance was nowhere near as efficient as Walton’s. She needed 31 shots to get her 41 points, whereas as Walton needed only 22 to get his 44.

But consider the following:

Walton played in the low post. Most of his points were on feeds (often lobs) from his pal Greg Lee, the unsung hero of the game.

Clark, by contrast, was Iowa’s primary ball handler. She confronted the entire South Carolina defense, often with three players keying on her. Her points came from all three levels, including five three-pointers some of which seemed to originate in another time zone.

Moreover, the national championship Walton helped bring to UCLA was its ninth in ten years and the Bruins were heavily favored over Memphis State. The Iowa women were playing in their first Final Four in 30 years. South Carolina — the defending champion with an unbeaten record this season — was heavily favored.

In the end, comparing Walton’s performance to Clark’s has an apples to oranges feel. A better comparison might be to Bill Bradley’s performances in the 1965 NCAA tournament.

Bradley led underdog Princeton to a 109-69 rout over Providence to fire the Ivy Leaguers into the Final Four. He finished with 41 points, 10 rebounds, and nine assists. The game was played in College Park, Maryland. My high schools buddies who were lucky enough to attend still talk about it.

Bradley’s line in the Providence game looks a lot like Clark’s line against South Carolina. Remember, though, that Bradley got his 41 points without the benefit of the three-point shot, which hadn’t yet come into basketball. But also keep in mind that Bradley scored fewer than 40 percent of his team’s points. Last night, Clark scored more than half of Iowa’s.

Bradley continued to dazzle at the Final Four. He scored 29 points before fouling out with about five minutes to play in a losing effort against powerful Michigan. Then, in the third place game (yes, they used to play one), he erupted for 58 points in a 118-82 thrashing of Wichita State.

Breaking Oscar Robertson’s single-game NCAA tournament scoring record, Bradley shot 22-of-29 from the field and 14-of-15 from the free-throw line. He also collected 17 rebounds.

Bradley was named the Final Four’s outstanding player despite playing for the third place team.

On Sunday, Iowa will take on LSU in the final game. We’ll see whether Clark can match Bradley’s Final Four total of 87 points and whether she can lead her team to the championship.

Whichever way it goes, Clark is a history-making basketball star and a riveting, irresistible presence on the court in something like the way Bill Bradley was, all those years ago.