February 24, 1996 – a day that will live in infamy.

For Massachusetts’ men’s basketball fans, the memory is a painful one. It was then, on that cold, New England afternoon that George Washington, led by old nemesis Mike Jarvis, posted the single greatest victory in the history of its men’s basketball program when the Colonials defeated top-ranked, undefeated Massachusetts 86-76 at the Mullins Center.

From there, UMass went on to win another nine games in a row and captured its fifth consecutive Atlantic 10 title, but eventually fell to National Champion Kentucky in the NCAA Final Four. However, riding the coattails of such amazing success, head coach John Calipari bolted Amherst following the season to take a multi-million dollar contract with the NBA’s New Jersey Nets, and Minuteman basketball has suffered because of it ever since.

Now, eight years and one day later, it’s the Maroon and White who will try to play spoiler in the cruelest way for No. 2 St. Joseph’s and their legion of fans, when the Hawks put their 24-game winning streak on the line at the Mullins Center.

For beleaguered coach Steve Lappas and the Minutemen, the opportunity – like it was for Jarvis and the Colonials in ’96 – is there for the taking. Reduce the number of unbeaten teams in the nation to one – Stanford – and UMass will become the talk of the college basketball world, much like GW was when it knocked off the team that ‘Refused to Lose.’

However unlike Jarvis, Lappas is seemingly on his last legs at UMass, and may be coaching to save his job tonight. Coming off an unbelievably ugly loss at lowly Fordham on Saturday, the Minutemen are once again suffering through a losing season, and have seen fan support plummet to grotesque levels of ineptitude.

Without a marquee win of this degree, the 2003-04 season will once again be considered a failure by any standards, let alone the nearly-unreachable ones set by maroon and white-clad hopers and dreamers pining for the glory days. With the fan base that once filled the 9,493-seat Mullins Center nightly having either graduated or vacated the Pioneer Valley with Calipari, those remaining are left to take their frustrations out on an undeserving target: Lappas.

The fact remains, what the Minutemen accomplished in the early 90s was a pure example of catching lightning – a.k.a. Marcus Camby – in a bottle. Prior to Camby’s arrival, Calipari worked to build the Minutemen into perennial national contenders and A-10 dominants. With the arrival of No. 21, UMass crossed the threshold into the national elite, setting the stage for an epic season and an epic decline.

Now, as St. Joe’s attempts to better UMass’ record unbeaten streak, the Hawks have similarly trapped natural electricity. Prior to National Player of the Year candidate Jameer Nelson’s arrival on Hawk Hill, SJU was a perennial national contender atop the A-10. Now, with Nelson’s tenure nearing a close, the Hawks are making their run at becoming the first wire-to-wire unbeaten since UNLV.

As Boston Globe columnist Michael Holley pointed out in a recent piece, luring a dominant, immediate-impact player like Camby to a place like UMass is a thing of the past. With the evolution of the Internet, players like Camby don’t sneak from Hartford, Connecticut to anywhere but the cream of the D-I basketball crop, they sneak up on you, like Nelson.

Point being? Continue to give Steve Lappas and these Minutemen some time. Through the frustration of three painful seasons, Lappas has managed to lure some quality, young impact players to Amherst. In some instances, he’s been more successful than his predecessor, Bruiser Flint. However luck (i.e. Stephen Briggs, Michael Lasme) has not been on his side.

Whether or not St. Joe’s runs the table and captures a national title or not, all should remain well in Philly. Head coach Phil Martelli and his system are entrenched on Hawk Hill and with Hawk fans, and serve as an ideal model for what Lappas could become: recruiting solid talent with each passing year, always just one big break away from a magical season and a dance with destiny.

For Lappas, the same could be true if he is provided with similar faith that Calipari was in the late 1980s, and is not asked to recreate the impossible that many feel he needs to in order to keep his job. Regardless of what many believe, his program and its young talent is on the upswing, and may be just two years away from legitimacy and one big break beyond that from a return to national prominence.

Whether or not St. Joe’s surreal season comes to a fitting end tonight or not, the Hawks should serve as a reminder of what could be. Give Steve Lappas the time, the confidence and the resources, and a perennial A-10 contender with national aspirations he will soon produce. Fire Lappas if he does not accomplish the unthinkable tonight, and February 24, 1996 will never again be possible.