New Orleans — The Orangemen winning the title game would blur reality. At least Bobby Kelton thought so before last night’s game.

‘My one dream in life is to see them win it all,’ said the 1972 graduate at a pep rally for the team.

So after Kirk Hinrich’s last-second 3-point shot landed in Kueth Duany’s hands and the final second ticked off the clock, it is fitting he struggled describing the emotions.

‘It is hard to put into words,’ Kelton said. ‘We waited 35 years for this.’

Along with his friend Jim Gordon, who graduated two years earlier, SU sports has been an ongoing trend since the pair’s early days on the Hill in the late ‘60s. They met on the now long-defunct baseball team with Kelton playing right field and Gordon splitting time behind the plate as well as at first and third base. Their friendship never wavered as they traveled to SU games near and far, finding the necessary closure right here, in New Orleans.

They watched together at a sports bar as Keith Smart hit the jump shot in 1987 that effectively delayed Jim Boeheim’s first national championship for 16 years. When the team made it to the finals in 1996, Gordon was on hand in the Meadowlands to see Syracuse again to be denied. Kelton’s career as a stand-up comic, one that saw him make 21 appearances on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson, prevented him from joining him. They came to those games hoping to win but never expecting it as they did Monday.

‘Last time we played Kentucky we hoped we would win by some miracle,’ he said. ‘This time we have our superstar, we have our role-players.’

Aside from a rabid fandom, the duo’s biggest tie to the team is their friendship to assistant coach Bernie Fine, who was Gordon’s brother in the Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity during their time as students. The two stayed close since graduating, and memories of their time together are still fresh in Gordon’s mind.

During one prank, Gordon’s pledge class took advantage of Fine’s appetite by telling the house cook to whip up several plates of brownies, something odd since the cook never made dessert. As expected, Fine took down about a half dozen, not expecting the added ingredient — Exlax. As Gordon remembers, the fraternity president had the last laugh.

‘He made us come back and clean it up,’ Gordon said.

After Fine’s Orangemen beat Oklahoma in Albany, Gordon left a message on his long-time friend’s voice mail to congratulate him on his big win. Fine’s message offered more than a pat on the back.

‘He said, ‘Gordo, I got two for you, you coming?’ and I said I wouldn’t miss it for the world,’ he said.

Although Gordon was a baseball player he also participated in intramural football with several other of his fraternity brothers, including Fine, who played center. Try as they might though, no one could stop the quarterback for the Delta Upsilon squad, a young Boeheim.

‘He could really do it all,’ he added.

These days both call Southern California home as Kelton continues to tour (he maintains that the audience at his next gig will be deluged with SU championship humor) and Gordon works as a word processing teacher at Nicholas Junior High. Both help their friend Fine out in the summers by sleeping in residence halls so they can coach kids in summer clinics at the Carrier Dome.

Through all the memories, it was under another dome that so many indelible were made. Kelton said that as Carmelo Anthony, Billy Edelin and Duany all missed free-throws down the stretch, he could sense another heartbreak coming.

‘I really started to get a sick feeling in my stomach,’ he said.

But it never came, replacing the familiar crush of a narrow loss with the thrill of validation. A validation that had eluded Kelton, Gordon and all SU fans for the entirety of the basketball program. When they knew the game was over, the pair hugged and screamed. In retrospect, Kelton said that a simple game should not make someone act the way they did.

Even as Gordon wanted to lead his friend to the Marriott, where the team would be returning victorious, Kelton found it hard to get away from the structure that saw the defining chapter of their journey.

‘I can’t tear myself away from this stadium,’ he said.

Across the main entrance to the Louisiana Superdome a banner reads, ‘The road ends here.’ For these two, it did.

Published on April 7, 2003 at 12:00 pm