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Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2012 > January > 14 > Entry
Where Buster’s KO of Tyson ranks
Buster Douglas, the man who knocked out Mike Tyson, was in town today to lift up his former Sinclair Community College basketball team.
A decade before Buster stunned the sports world and flattened the then-unbeaten and seemingly invincible Tyson in Tokyo in 1990, he was the star of the Sinclair basketball team.
After playing for the Columbus Linden McKinley High team that won the state crown in 1977, he played a season for Coffeyville C.C., a national juco power in Kansas before returning to Ohio and seeking out then-Sinclair coach Kevin O’Neill.
“I had the Davis twins from McKinley’s championship team, so I’d seen Buster play,” said O’Neill. “Then in late spring or early summer (of 1979) he shows up here. He said he wasn’t going back to Kansas because the guy he’d gone out there with had gone on to Minnesota.
“He wanted to come back around here and asked if I had any room….I said ‘certainly’ and he became quite a player for us. He was hard-nosed, but a perfect gentleman for us. He was just a nice person.”
Douglas was the team’s leading scorer and rebounder - averaging 21.2 points and 10 rebounds a game - was named the MVP of the 1979-80 season and made the NJCAA All-Region XII team
After a season at Sinclair, he went on to Mercyhurst, but before ever suiting up, he returned to boxing - which he had done as a young amateur under the tutelage of his dad, heralded pro boxer Bill “Dynamite” Douglas.
Ten years later Buster stunned the sports world by knocking out the unbeaten Tyson in 10 rounds and winning the world heavyweight crown.
Douglas was honored Saturday before the Sinclair men’s team took on Owens C.C. He not only was given his old jersey, but he also spoke to the team before the game and then sat on the bench.
The 76-year-old O’Neill, who still has the best winning percentage of any Sinclair coach in history, was honored, too.
Friday, ONeill remembered the night Douglas won the crown.
“The night he knocked out Tyson I was with my wife, Connie, at a dance at St. Mary’s Church in Franklin…and I left her there,” O’Neill laughed. “She said, ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ and I said, “I’m going home to watch him.’
“She said, ‘He’s going to get beat,’ and I told her, ‘Well, then, he’s going to have to get beat in front of me.’”
Although it had been in the world of hoops - not haymakers - he had seen Douglas more than hold his own night after night after night.
“I might be a little biased, but in my book Buster knocking out Tyson was the biggest upset EVER in (U.S) sports history,” O’Neill said. “I was just so proud of him that night.”
We all were proud of Buster and I almost agree with O’Neill on the monumental impact of that KO.
Here’s my TOP TEN list of the greatest sports upsets of all time in the United States.
10 — N.C. State knocks off Phi Slamma Jamma powerhouse Houston in the 1983 NCAA Championship game unleashing Wolfpack coach Jimmy Valvano for his memorable “I can’t believe this is happening” run around the court.
9 - The New York Mets, an expansion team, defeat the Baltimore Orioles and their mighty pitching staff in the 1969 World Series.
8 — Texas Western makes both a social and a hoops statement when Coach Don Haskins starts five black players against Adolph Rupp and his top-ranked, all white Kentucky Wildcats and wins the 1966 NCAA Championship game, 72-65.
7 — Villanova, a No. 8 seed, shoots 78.6 percent from the floor and edges Georgetown, the defending champs and No. 1 team in the nation, in the 1985 NCAA Championship game. Villanova remains the lowest seed ever to win the tournament.
6 — Billy Mills does what no American before or since has ever done. He wins the 10,000 meters at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics even though he was over a minute slower than the favorites after the prelims.
5 — The New York Jets make good on Joe Namath’s promise and defeat the mighty Baltimore Colts in the Super Bowl III at the Orange Bowl in 1969.
4 - Rulon Gardner overpowers the menacing Alexander Karelin to win the Greco Roman gold medal at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. Karelin had a 13-year winning streak, had won the past three Olympic gold medals and had NEVER lost in international competition.
3 - Man o’ War loses the only race of his career - he had won his first 20 starts - when an 100-to-1 long-shot appropriately named Upset beats him at the Sanford Memorial in 1919.
2 — Buster Douglas, a 42-1 underdog, dominates Mike Tyson, who came into the bout 37-0 with 33 knockouts,. Coming into the fight Tyson had knocked out a totally overwhelmed (he never got to land a punch) Carl “The Truth” Williams in 93 seconds and a completely petrified Michael Spinks in just 90 seconds. Douglas won the early rounds, got up from a knockdown in the eighth, closed Tyson’s left eye with his jab in the ninth and then knocked the champ down for the first time in his career - and out - in the 10th.
1 — The United State’s college boys beat the mighty team of Soviet professionals in the semifinals on the way to winning ice hockey gold at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid. It truly was The Miracle on Ice.
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By joe
January 19, 2012 9:38 AM | Link to this
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By joe
January 18, 2012 9:02 AM | Link to this
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By joe
January 17, 2012 1:36 PM | Link to this
By nyc
January 14, 2012 8:37 PM | Link to this
when did japan and australia become part of the usa????