Any survey of the history of Georgetown basketball’s 100 years is bound to focus on 27 of them. The John Thompson Jr. era, punctuated by 14 consecutive NCAA appearances between 1979 and 1992, constituted one of the most successful quarter-centuries any basketball program has ever seen, not to mention the last time the Hoyas were a serious threat to win a national title.

But Thompson’s tenure, which ended in 1999, was so expansive that many current followers of the Blue and Gray fail to realize Georgetown’s prominence prior to the 1972-73 season. The Hoyas’ invitation to the 1975 NCAA tournament was not their first, and the seasons before 1972 were in no short supply of great games, records or figures.

The most important such figure was Athletic Director Maurice Joyce, a commissioned U.S. Marshal who once instructed President Theodore Roosevelt in boxing. After leaving Georgetown he served as a Department of Justice special agent for 22 years.

Joyce’s greatest achievement came before he joined the Justice Department, however. From the dawn of the 20th century he was the D.C. area’s ambassador to amateur and college basketball, helping found university squads at places like Navy and Virginia, and constructing the first five-man basketball team in the District of Columbia.

Not to mention the first team at Georgetown. Joyce was hired as the AD in 1906 and started coaching basketball the next year, managing the Blue and Gray through four games that season. The first game in Georgetown basketball history was a 22-11 win against Virginia, and the other three games that season were a win and two losses against George Washington.

Joyce, a boxer, was a fitting coach for the early 1900s. The game of basketball was a struggle ” it was considerably more physical, as well as low-scoring, than the don’t-brush-up-against-me sport it is today.

It also featured a direct rivalry between Georgetown and GW, begun in an 18-16 thriller that served as the Hatchetites’ first defeat of the Blue and Gray in any sport. Even the Washington Post got in on the GW fans’ excitement, awarding the game story top billing on its sports page.

When Fred Rice (FLL 1910), the star of GW’s victory, enrolled at Georgetown in the fall of 1907, he was supposed to help the team weather a decline. Only two players from Georgetown’s inaugural season were returning, and the team’s six-man roster was at a barebones minimum in size.

Yet the Blue and Gray raised eyebrows all season long, going 6-2 and opening the year with a tremendous 58-3 drubbing of Maryland. In January, a 42-19 defeat of Virginia earned Georgetown the unofficial title of ‘Champions of the South.’/p>

Financial troubles hit the program the next season, prompting the university to end its official basketball program and producing a year of rivalry between a new, booster club-supported team and an unofficial undergraduate team organized by the university.

James Colliflower (C 1909), the student whose booster-club had helped save basketball on the Hilltop while he was in law school, succeeded Joyce as coach in 1911. Colliflower guided the Hilltoppers to three successful seasons, but it was not until 1918, under the tutelage of Head Coach John O’Reilly, that Georgetown truly hit its stride.

O’Reilly’s top player was guard Fred Fees (FLL 1919), whose career average of 17.1 points per game remains the third highest in Georgetown history. In one game he scored more than the entire Gallaudet team as he contributed 30 points to a 48-22 victory. The Blue and Gray went 9-1 in 1918-19, then 13-1 a year later.

O’Reilly produced legendary success with the Blue and Gray, and the team was dealt a heavy blow when he developed a serious illness in 1921. O’Reilly missed two seasons, and his absence produced deficits in recruiting and fan interest that would plague Georgetown through the 1920s.

Enter Coach Elmer Ripley, a new hire and a former professional player. Enter, too, a new arena ” the off-campus Arcadia ” where Georgetown began its 1927-28 season with an upset of Rutgers on its way to a 12-1 record.

‘So desperate was the defense that the comedy was supplied when the defenders were sprawling themselves all over the floor in their futile attempt to hold the Georgetowners off,’The Hoya reported. ‘[The substitutes] were even more desperate and more funny. Their falling and diving methods were even better than their predecessors, and the crowd was in an uproar.’/p>

When Ripley left to coach at Yale, Georgetown embarked on an eight-year exercise in futility, never finishing more than one game over .500 (and often playing much worse) in the new Eastern Intercollegiate Basketball Association.

Luckily for Georgetown, Ripley returned in 1938-39. That season, the Hoyas were co-champions of the EIBC.

The success would reach a peak in 1942-43. A year before, the Hoyas had been surprisingly mediocre, going 9-11 in Ripley’s fourth year back at the helm. This year, with all but one member of the 1941-42 team serving in World War II, the squad of inexperienced underclassmen started the season with seven consecutive wins.

They finished the season 19-4, securing invitations to the then-NCAA comparable NIT tournaments. They upset NYU in the first round. They overcame a five-point halftime deficit against DePaul, a favorite in the second round. Then, up by only four points with 10 minutes to play, they put in sophomore forward/center Henry ‘Hank’Hyde (C ’47) to guard 6-foot-10 giant George Mikan.

Hyde was just a backup, and Mikan was a titan of college basketball, eventually becoming the first legitimate superstar of the National Basketball Association. Hyde ultimately became a very successful man himself, though not in basketball. Rep. Hyde (R-Ill.) has served in Congress since 1975 and is currently chairman of the House International Relations Committee.

Somehow, Hyde, who averaged 0.2 points per game over his 11-game Georgetown career, convinced Ripley to put him in after center John ahnken fouled out. And to the surprise of most of the 14,085 in attendance, Hyde stopped Mikan.

Georgetown won 53-49, advancing to the Final Four and prompting one Hoya fan to utter one well-reported declaration: ‘Believe it or not, by Ripley!’/p>

The Hoya defense was not so strong in the next round. Despite leading 31-26 with six minutes left, Georgetown dropped a 46-34 heartbreaker to Wyoming in the semifinals.

There was no basketball at Georgetown for the remaining two years of World War II, and soon after its reinstatement, the Hoyas sunk to the depths of mediocrity. There was an NIT berth (and first-round defeat) in 1952, but it wasn’t until 1963-64, under Coach Tom O’Keefe, that the team was able to fully stick its neck out above water.

The O’Keefe years were successful ” take Georgetown’s record of 16-8 in 1955-56 ” but devoid of any postseason laurels. And when O’Keefe retired in 1966, the team reverted to .500 form.

In 1969-70, led by Coach Jack Magee and sophomore forward Art White’s (SFS ’76) 15.1 points per game, the Hoyas went 18-7. But in the first round of the then-important NIT, they were faced with the daunting task of containing LSU legend ‘Pistol’Pete aravich.

It was up to senior guard Mike Laska (CAS ’70) to do his best impression of Henry Hyde 27 years earlier. And believe it or not, by Magee, Maravich was held to one field goal over the first 10 minutes ” and a self-proclaimed ‘pitiful’game-long performance of 6- for-16 from the field.

The problem was that LSU had some offensive alternatives. Their trio of 6-foot-8 Danny Hester, 6-foot-8 Al Sanders and 6-foot-9 Bill Newton scored 56 and forced three Hoyas to foul out. Georgetown was down 81-74 with 3:08 left.

With a suddenly airtight defense, the Hoyas scored six unanswered points, narrowing the margin to one with 0:17 remaining. They had no choice but to foul Maravich. He sank both free throws; the Hoyas scored again. But it was too late. 83-82 LSU.

Georgetown wasn’t far off from a return to glory, but over the next two seasons, the team collapsed to records 12-14 and 3-23, prompting officials to retain the coaching services of one John Thompson Jr., who would take the Hoyas to the NCAA tournament in his third season.

The rest, as we know, is history.