Flip Saunders: 'He was our point guard'

The Indiana Hoosiers were the defending national champions. The Gophers were feeling the heat from the NCAA and were ineligible to participate in a postseason tournament.

On Jan. 27, 1977, the Gophers went into Assembly Hall and put a 79-60 whipping on the Hoosiers. There were 10 seconds left and Flip Saunders, the Gophers' senior point guard, was at midcourt, jumping up and down and shouting, "I can't believe this! I can't believe this!"

That was as happy an occasion as a Minnesota basketball lifer could experience: watching the Gophers blow out a Bobby Knight team in Bloomington, Ind.

Sunday, there was a far different emotion for Minnesota basketball lifers as they shook their heads in anguish and said, "I can't believe this."

Saunders, who came here as an undersized guard from a blue-collar upbringing in Cuyahoga Heights, Ohio, died after complications during treatment for Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Saunders had announced through the Timberwolves on Aug. 11 that he was being treated for the disease. The remission rate for this is over 80 percent, and Flip's public stance was fully optimistic.

The third-party information circulated within the media kept getting worse. And around noon Sunday, the Wolves sent out a one-sentence notice that Saunders had died.

Flip? Dead at 60?

"I can't believe this," Minnesota basketball lifers from all over said, no matter the pessimistic whispers they had been hearing.

Flip was Bill Musselman's coach on the elevated floor of Williams Arena. Flip was Jim Dutcher's point guard on the Gophers' most talented team ever. Flip was the kid coach who got us interested in a high-powered junior college team at Golden Valley Lutheran. Flip was the guy who could get you to drive to La Crosse, Wis., to watch his CBA Catbirds, just for the conversation.

"He could walk into any room and get a conversation going," said Jon Roe, the Star Tribune's beat reporter when Saunders played for the Gophers. "He had that personality, from the time he came here as an 18-year-old. It's an amazing story, a kid from the most modest of backgrounds, becoming a part owner and president of an NBA team."

Saunders was rescued from the CBA by his old pal from the Gophers, Kevin McHale, and installed as the Timberwolves coach. He took over for Bill Blair 20 games into the 1995-96 season with a no-chance team, and he was fired 51 games into the 2004-05 season.

In the eight seasons in between, Saunders and the Wolves had their only eight playoff appearances, and finally advanced — to the Western Conference finals — in 2004. He was the only Timberwolves coach among 10 individuals who served with a claim to being successful. He was about to enter his third season of trying to revive owner Glen Taylor's franchise from its woeful condition as the basketball boss (as well as coach).

Hodgkin's lymphoma put an end to that determined effort.

The Timberwolves will honor Saunders with a uniform marking, no doubt, and let's hope they don't go with initials — with PS — because Minnesota's basketball lifers would have to think a moment to understand.

Any tribute must simply read "Flip," because that's who he was to all Minnesotans and to all of basketball.

The nickname came from his beloved mother, Kay, who heard customers in a hair salon talking about a "flip" and figured that it was a nickname to fit her energetic, sports-loving son.

Kay was right. If you were there when Saunders walked into a gymnasium, into any room, in the past four decades and heard a Minnesotan say, "Hello, Phil," that would've made you the first.

Flip was from Ohio, and he spent time working on his coaching craft in other locales, and he had to go to Detroit and Washington to get his NBA coaching fix after being let go here, but at his heart, Flip was a Minnesota guy.

And a family man.

I knew that for sure a few days after he returned to the Timberwolves as president and part owner on May 3, 2013. The Gophers were playing a baseball game at Siebert Field and it was freezing.

Right before the first pitch, Saunders showed up in an overcoat. One of his twin daughters was dating a Gophers player. Yet, this was not a ceremonial appearance. He stayed to see if his Gophers won.

He also talked with every civilian who wanted to ask about the Wolves, and mentioned with pride of when he was part of an intramural baseball dynasty as a Minnesota student.

My son Jim, a major in the Marine Corps, has not lived in the state in almost 30 years. At midafternoon Sunday, there was a text from Jim expressing dismay at Saunders' death.

"What's your memory of Flip?" I asked.

The well-traveled major responded from Washington, D.C.: "He was our point guard."

Ours. Minnesota's. No one else's.

Patrick Reusse can be heard 3-6 p.m. weekdays on AM-1500. preusse@startribune.com