Metro boys basketball was strong in the mid-80s

Arrange these thoughts in your mind.The Metro boys' basketball scene is healthy, perhaps as healthy as ever. The two teams with the most wins and the highest rankings among the state's big-school class over the past few seasons are Linn-Mar and Kennedy.Interest is high. Sold-out gyms are assured anytime those two teams meet. Standing-room-only is the order, not the exception.We could be talking right now, of course, with 10-0 Kennedy and 10-1 Linn-Mar holding down two of the top three spots in the most recent AP Class 4A rankings.We also could be talking about the early 1980s, when those programs - along with Regis in a class just behind Linn-Mar and Kennedy - fielded the best teams the state had to offer. Let's talk 1984, 25 years ago.Here is how the e-mail I received two weeks ago from former Linn-Mar (and Mount Vernon and Jefferson and Marion and Coe) coach Bob Landis began:"Just sitting down here in 75 (degree) weather and daydreaming about my former life."Landis, 76, winters in Florida. He was reminiscing about the quality of boys' basketball in the Metro area in the early 1980s, when Regis under Coach Dick Breitbach won three straight Class 2A state championships from 1982 to 1984 (there were only three classes back then in an era that actually made sense), Landis coached Linn-Mar to an unbeaten 3A championship in 1983 and the late Dave Etienne guided Kennedy to the 3A title in 1984."I think from 1981 to 1984, in a lot people's minds, was the greatest high school basketball era in Cedar Rapids history," Landis said during an engaging telephone chat last week. "We had just great basketball at just about every spot. Regis was very good then, and of course Linn-Mar and Kennedy and Wash. It was really a big-time era."Landis was specifically recalling the 1984 district tournament championship game played between his Linn-Mar Lions and Etienne's Kennedy Cougars. It became the first, and so far only, high school game played at the University of Iowa's Carver-Hawkeye Arena.That game featured Iowa Mr. Basketball and former Iowa standout Al Lorenzen on the Kennedy side. Tim Batterson and current Kennedy assistant Jeff Hrubes also starred. On the Linn-Mar side was the late John Anderson and Scott Anderson (no relation), who both went on to play at Ohio State.Landis recalled that two weeks before Kennedy and Linn-Mar played the district final at Carver-Hawkeye, the two teams played a regular season game at the (then) Five Seasons Center.Linn-Mar was riding a 42-game winning streak after winning the 3A state championship in 1983 with a 25-0 record, but the Lions' point guard, Jim Lancaster, "blew his knee out" and Kennedy won, 59-49.Both teams won their district openers and the tournament final was scheduled to be played at Washington. The state athletics association decided a bigger venue was necessary and the game was moved to Carver-Hawkeye."In those days, literally, if you went to a high school basketball game involving the big schools in Cedar Rapids, by 5:30 (p.m.) it was standing room only," Landis recalled. "It didn't matter what gym you were in. It was a big item when the (intra) city schools played."In Landis' memory, somewhere between 8,000 and 9,000 people showed up to watch the game. And as it turned out, neither team played particularly well on the big court."It was a poorly played game," Landis said, recalling situations as if he had old press clippings in front of him. "With about a minute to go, Kennedy was ahead by three points and we had the ball and I called a timeout. We had a sophomore on our team whose name was Scot Lumsden, the younger brother of Todd Lumsden (1983 Iowa Mr. Basketball). Scot was a shooter ... and we put him in to make a 3-pointer for us and with 15 seconds to go, he hits a '3.'"Kennedy came down the floor and got the ball to Lorenzen, who everyone in the gym assumed would take the last shot. Instead, Lorenzen dished to Batterson, who nailed a 10-foot jumper at the final buzzer for the 39-37 Kennedy win."It was an exciting end to really a pretty badly played game," Landis said.Kennedy went on to win the state championship. That was 25 years ago. Oh boy, those were the days. Days not that much different from today, considering the teams involved.Contact the writer: (319) 368-8841 or jeff.dahn@gazcomm.com

By Jeff DahnThe Gazette jeff.dahn@gazettecommunications.com