Battle of the Ages - 1939 LIU Champs 96-91 Elite 8 Double OT Win Over 2025 Auburn

 You can click on these basketball reference links to see what our two featured stars really looked like LOL, but here is our banner on the first of our four Elite 8 games in the tournament of newly created teams. Johni Broome was on one of the 2025 teams whose player cards were calculated after the season ended, and we finally pulled together enough stats to make our oldest team in the game, as Irving Torgoff led Long Island to their second straight NCAA title in 1939.

Our 376th all-time Value Add Basketball Game was our best. Two players for each team had fouled out by the end of regulation when Auburn's Denver Jones hit both free throws for a 72-70 lead, only to have Irving Torgoff (31 points) score at the buzzer to send it to overtime 72-72.  At the end of the 1st overtime Auburn's Johni Broome (29 points) grabbed an offensive rebound and kicked it out to Oscar Shechtman who hit a shot to make it 87-87, then Broome blocked a would be game-winner and grabbed the defensive rebound as well to send it to a 2nd overtime at 87-87. The first college basketball dynasty, Long Island, finally got breathing room when the started the second overtime with an 8-0 run and held on for a 96-91 win to be our first Final Four team from the newly created teams. It truly was a game for the ages. The entire box score is at the bottom of the blog.

In 1939 style, Long Island drew 27 fouls but then only hit 20 of the 35 free throws to almost fall short. The game also had the most blocked shots and rebounds we have ever recorded in a Value Add Basketball game, with Long Island having the edge 17-15 in blocked shots and 56-44 in rebounds.

As the bracket further down shows, the 1939 Long Island team will advance to the semifinal to race the winner of the game between the 1950 City College of New York (CCNY) - the only team to ever win the NIT and NCAA the same season, and Jerry Tarkanian's 1972 Long Beach State.

Here are the actual scoresheet and player cards, with pennies and diamonds marking the players after two players from each team fouled out.

Pos	2025 Auburn	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl
1-PG	Denver Jones	18	3	2	5	5	4	1	2	3
2-SG	Miles Kelly	5	0	1	3	4	6	4	1	2
3-SG	Chad Baker-Mazara	4	0	1	2	2	5	0	0	5
4-PF	Chaney Johnson	5	0	2	1	2	6	0	2	5
5-C	Johni Broome	29	1	11	4	7	17	0	6	1
Pos	Bench	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl
1-PG	Tahaad Pettiford	12	2	2	2	2	1	1	0	4
2-SG	JP Pegues	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1
3-SG	Chris Moore	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1
4-PF	Ja'Heim Hudson	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1
5-C	Dylan Cardwell	12	0	6	0	0	2	0	4	4
	21 Turnovers	91	6	28	17	22	44	6	15	27
Pos	Long Island 1939		3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl
1-PG	Oscar Shechtman	10	2	1	2	3	2	3	1	5
2-SG	Dan Kaplowitz	13	0	5	3	4	4	2	3	3
3-SG	Irving Torgoff	31	4	7	5	5	9	6	6	3
4-PF	John Bromberg	17	0	7	3	7	13	2	0	2
5-C	Arthur Hillhouse	2	0	1	0	0	12	1	5	5
Pos	Bench	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl
1-PG	Si Lobello	9	0	3	3	6	1	0	1	1
2-SG	Myron Sewitch	2	0	1	0	0	1	1	0	1
3-SG	Irving Zeitlin	4	0	1	2	6	6	0	0	1
4-PF	Joe Shelly	6	0	2	2	4	7	1	1	1
5-C	Butch Schwartz	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	2
	14 Turnovers	96	6	29	20	35	56	16	17	24