AUTOGRAPHED BY BOTH

KAREEM ABDUL JABBAR & ELVIN HAYES

PSA AUTHENTIC

PSA/DNA 10 GEM-MINT AUTOGRAPHS

In men's college basketball, the Game of the Century was a historic National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) game between the Houston Cougars and the UCLA Bruins played on January 20, 1968, at the Astrodome in Houston, Texas. It was the first NCAA regular season game broadcast nationwide in prime time. It established college basketball as a sports commodity on television and paved the way for the modern "March Madness" television coverage.

Ted Nance, the sports information director for the University of Houston, put the schedule together.[4] UCLA sports information director J. D. Morgan talked Bruin head coach John Wooden into the game by explaining how great it would be for college basketball.[4] Nance put advertisements in the Cougar football programs touting the game as the "Game of the Century."[4]

The game was televised nationally via a syndication package through the TVS Television Network, with Dick Enberg announcing and Bob Pettit providing color commentary.[4] Morgan had insisted to TVS owner Eddie Einhorn that TVS use Enberg, the Bruins' play-by-play announcer.[5][6] Einhorn paid $27,000 for the broadcast rights on TVS.[7] TVS signed up 120 stations, many of which would preempt regularly scheduled network programming.[8] The basketball floor actually came from the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena.[4]

The Bruins arrived in Houston with a 47-game, two-and-a-half-season winning streak. The Cougars were also undefeated since the last meeting between the two teams.

The first half between the AP Poll's No. 1 UCLA and No. 2 Houston closed with the Cougars up by three points.[4] The second half saw the tension between the squads highlighted within the matchup of Houston's Elvin Hayes and UCLA's Lew Alcindor (later known as Kareem Abdul Jabbar). Hayes, a 6-foot-9 forward, was not directly matched against the 7–2 Alcindor, but he did block three of Alcindor's shots, and the crowd roared his nickname, "Big E."[4]

With two minutes remaining in the game, the score was tied at 69 after the Bruins' Lucius Allen made a pair of free throws.[5] Hayes took a shot and was fouled by Bruins reserve Jim Nielsen.[4] Hayes, playing with four fouls in the second half, scored two free throws. The Bruins still had time to score, but an attempted basket by Allen would not drop. On the last possession, UCLA's All-American guard Mike Warren committed a rare mental error deflecting out of bounds a pass meant for UCLA's star shooter Lynn Shackelford, who was unguarded in the corner.[4]

In the end, the Cougars pulled the upset, 71–69, ending the Bruins' 47-game winning streak.