Dwayne "Pearl" Washington: The First Point Guard I Fell in Love With
By Jason McIntyre
The first point guard I fell in love with was Dwayne “Pearl” Washington of Syracuse. I can’t pinpoint the exact date, but a childhood friend’s father attended Seton Hall University. He was a Big East fan. Living outside of Washington DC, we were mostly exposed to only the Georgetown Hoyas, a juggernaut in the early 80s led by Patrick Ewing.
The Hoyas played the Orangemen three times in the 1983-1984 season, and won all three games. I loved those Hoyas teams – the backcourt of Michael Jackson (who grew up a 3-pointer away from where we resided in Northern Virginia) and Horace Broadnax, do-it-all swingman Reggie Williams, the great shooting guard David Wingate, and Ewing’s bodyguard before Charles Oakley made the job famous, Michael Graham – but the player who always caught my eye was the dynamic Syracuse point guard, Pearl Washington. (As such, I developed a fondness for the Orange.) Something about Washington’s game is seared into my memory as it was my first real exposure to basketball. The Washington Bullets were awful, and I didn’t get to an NBA game until late 1984.
In the pre-3-point era, Washington was the consummate point guard – breaking defenders down off the dribble with his lethal crossover – or draining the mid-range jumper. Washington shot 54% from the field as a freshman, and 52% for his career at Syracuse.
I don’t remember this halfcourt game-winner, but YouTube is a wonderful thing:
How about this game-winner in the 1985 Big East tournament?
Can I interest you in the Georgetown-Syracuse rivalry? That, along with the St. John’s-Georgetown rivalry, feels to me like the birth of the Big East. Which is why I was so bitter the league was ripped apart a few years ago by conference realignment.
Why am I writing about Pearl Washington? He’s dying. He has a brain tumor. According to Syracuse.com, Washington was “gravely ill” Friday night.
Washington never had a great NBA career. He was a 1st round pick of the Nets in 1986, played three years in the NBA, and then spent two years in the CBA. But I’ll always remember his time at Syracuse, and being the first point guard I fell in love with.