It was December 5, 1994.

On a Monday night in Buffalo, Wake Forest visited Canisius for a men's basketball game at the old Memorial Auditorium.

My mom - whom friends and family members know is a basketball savant - and I attended the game. I was a senior year in high school. Our seats were in the upper golds (second closest to the floor) behind one of the baskets.

This was a game between two good times - Wake would make the Sweet 16, Canisius would make the NIT Final Four and had the core of an NCAA Tournament team. Wake Forest won, 74-60.

I was there to see Randolph Childress, the exciting Wake Forest guard who later in the season, would string together a legendary three-game run in the ACC Tournament.

But my mom couldn't take her eyes off another player for Wake Forest. A tall, skinny sophomore forward who had averaged just under 10 points and 10 rebounds a game as a freshman. He wasn't the star of the game, or of the team, but my mom saw something in the big man.

"I like him," she said starting that night. "I like him a lot."

Which is how, 22 years ago, before the rest of the world caught on, my mom knew Tim Duncan would be a star.