''I was nervous, but when we started getting down to 3-2-1, I got excited,'' Holt told the New York Times the following day.

Once Tim Duncan hit town, San Antonio started an impressive collection of championship trophies.

And who could blame him? Each time NBA deputy commissioner Russ Granik turned over a card with another team's logo on it, the Spur's odds of winning the grand prize — the right to draft Wake Forest All-American Tim Duncan, steadily increased.

Holt, who made the trip to New Jersey with Head Coach Gregg Popovich, occupied San Antonio's seat on the lottery set. Popovich watched the proceedings from a tent adjacent to the TV studio, while eating a sandwich and drinking a beer.

"And when I found out we got the No. 1 pick, I dropped my sandwich and beer and said, 'Oh, my God.' And the rest is history."

"I was pretty sure I was coming to Boston. They had the two picks. Then the sixth pick went by and the third pick went by, both to Boston, and, all of a sudden, I kinda had a renewed interest in what was going on. Then Philly came up -- and then I knew I was going to San Antonio and that was a great feeling. I just knew I was going to play."

Duncan did far more than just play. Four championships, three Finals MVP's, two regular season MVP's and one odd-numbered year dynasty later, he is widely considered to be the greatest power forward of all time.

Even back in 1997, Holt sensed what was coming.

"What an opportunity for us. We already have a great team, and add someone like Tim Duncan? I mean, the world is our oyster,'' he said.

The fact that the Spurs were even in the lottery that year was a fluke. San Antonio was a solid team, led by future Hall-of-Famer David Robinson. The year before the Spurs had 59 victories in route to winning the Midwest Division. However, Robinson suffered a season ending injury in the sixth game of the year. All-Star Sean Elliot was plagued by injuries and appeared in only 39 games. The injury bug was so bad that only one Spur, Greg Anderson, played in all 82 games.

The Spurs had the third worst record that year, finishing 20-62, but still had only a 21.4% chance of landing the top pick. The Boston Celtics, with the second worst record and an additional lottery pick acquired via a trade with Dallas, had the best odds (36%) of landing Duncan. Vancouver had the worst record but, due to their expansion agreement with the NBA, was not eligible to win the top pick.

As it turned out, the Celtics did not even come close, ending up with the third and sixth picks. It came down to the Spurs and the Philadelphia 76ers. That meant Duncan was going to play for either Popovich or his mentor, Larry Brown, who was the coach of the Sixers.

When the Spurs won, Brown was happy for his protégé. However, he still reflected on what might have been. After the draft, he was quoted as saying, "Can you imagine me walking out to my first day of practice as the head coach of the 76ers and seeing Allen Iverson and Tim Duncan out there?"

Actually, it is hard to imagine Duncan wearing anything but silver and black. He was the perfect fit for a team that needed only a slight nudge towards greatness.

And as great as Duncan has been, it was Robinson's arrival in 1987 that made it all possible. As Tom Orsborn of the San Antonio Express News pointed out in a beautifully written 2007 column, if the Admiral, one of the NBA's 50 greatest players of all-time, had decided to play elsewhere, the Spurs would have likely folded or moved to another city.

Likewise, Popovich and General Manager R.C. Buford form the core of the best front office in the league. They discovered and signed future all-stars Tony Parker of France and Manu Ginobili from Argentina. The Spurs' domination of the NBA has been a collaborative effort.

However, there is little doubt that the essential ingredient for the dynasty came San Antonio's way when the ping pong balls aligned in just the right way over a decade ago in a New Jersey television studio.