FAYETTEVILLE — Michael Collyar didn't play basketball for the Arkansas Razorbacks, but he hit one of the most memorable shots ever in Bud Walton Arena.
It was during a halftime contest for fans sponsored by the athletic department on Jan. 8, 2002, when the Razorbacks beat Mississippi State 75-64.
Collyar, then 22, banked in a half-court shot after hitting a layup, free throw and three-pointer to win $10,000.
The half-court shot may have been forgotten long ago except for the controversy that quickly followed.
Matt Shanklin, then the Razorbacks' assistant athletic director for marketing, waved off the shot because Collyar had slightly stepped over the half-court line.
Fans began booing loudly, including long-time Razorbacks Athletic Director Frank Broyles, who yelled, "That's awful! That's awful!"
Within a few minutes, it was announced University of Arkansas at Fayetteville Chancellor John White had authorized Collyar to receive $10,000 with $5,000 from the UA Foundation and $5,000 from the Razorback Foundation.
"I'm a Christian, so the day I put my faith in Jesus is the No. 1 moment in my life," Collyar said this week. "Then the next biggest things for me are being married and my two kids being born.
"But hitting that half-court shot is pretty awesome. It's a moment that's lasted 15 years.
"People still talk about it when they find out it was me. They don't remember my name, but they remember the shot and especially the controversy."
@jefflongUA thought: what about in memory of 15 yr anniversary I can try it again on Saturday for charity? Ha!
— Michael Collyar (@michaelcollyar) March 1, 2017
Collyar will attempt to hit all four shots again during halftime of Saturday's Arkansas-Georgia game in Walton Arena — at the invitation of Razorbacks Athletic Director Jeff Long — to raise money to help build Arkansas Children's Hospital in Northwest Arkansas.
Long has pledged to donate $5,000 to Arkansas Children's Hospital and $5,000 to the Razorback Foundation if Collyar makes all four shots.
Collyar's friends, Aaron and Jaye T. Marshall, have pledged to match donations up to $5,000 and donations also can be made at www.purecharity.com/support-the-shot.
For Collyar, who lives in Fayetteville and works at Tyson Foods in Springdale, raising funds to help Arkansas Children's Hospital be built in Northwest Arkansas hits home because he and his wife, Mandi, have an 8-year-old son, Matthias, who was born with cerebral palsy. They also have a daughter Makayla, who is 10.
"We go to the Arkansas Children's hospital in Little Rock anywhere from five to 10 times a year for our son," Collyar said. "So we're really looking forward to having the new hospital up here and anything we can do to help get that built would be a great thing."
A Louisville student being denied a $38,000 contest prize after hitting a half-court shot last week — because he had played high school basketball within the last six years — helped create Collyar's opportunity today.
Long, who has been at Arkansas since 2008, asked on his Twitter account Tuesday night hadn't something similar happened once at a Razorbacks game?
Collyar replied to Long that he was the guy who hit the half-court shot. They exchanged a few more tweets, including one in which Collyar sent Long the link to a YouTube video of his shots.
"I threw it out there to Jeff Long — just a shot in the dark really — that I'd like to do it again for charity," Collyar said. "I was thinking he wouldn't even entertain the thought, but he was like, 'We're doing it.'
"So it all happened pretty fast, within a couple of hours. I really appreciate him doing something like this on the fly, because I know the halftime for these games is heavily scripted ahead of time."
Collyar, 37, recalled that he had 24 seconds to hit all four shots in 2002. He's hoping he'll get 30 seconds today.
"I'm old and moving a little slower," he said with a laugh. "So I could really use those extra six seconds."
When Collyar hit the half-court shot 15 years ago, he had recently married and graduated from the UA with a computer engineering degree.
The Fort Smith native was working as an intern Tyson, where he's now a technical solutions architect.
One of Collyar's friends, Brian Wood, was initially picked to take part in the contest, but he declined and suggested Collyar.
Collyar, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, hadn't played on a basketball team since the seventh grade, but said he was calm about shooting in front of a large crowd in Walton Arena.
"I just didn’t want to embarrass myself out there," Collyar told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in 2002. "But for some reason, I really wasn’t all that nervous. I felt OK. And I knew the crowd was behind me. That was such a huge rush in itself."
Collyar said this week his emotions went from elation to disappointment when Shanklin waved off his half-court shot, but the elation returned with the announcement he still would get the $10,000.
Shanklin, who now works at LSU, said at the time that insurance Arkansas carried for promotions would not have paid the money because Collyar broke the contest rules by stepping over the half-court line.
Collyar said he's never been mad at Shanklin and felt sorry he was booed so loudly.
"It wasn't Matt Shankin's fault," Collyar said. "He was just doing what he had to do.
"I saw the sheet before the contest and it said you can't step over the line, but I did it accidentally.
"I didn't deserve to win, so the fact the University and John White and Frank Broyles stepped up was great."
Collyar said being able to pay off bills with the prize money helped convince him to attend graduate school. Taking classes at night while working in the day, he graduated from Arkansas with a master's degree in business in 2004.
"Hopefully Saturday we can take something that I didn't deserve and pay it forward, so to speak," Collyar said. "That's kind of the story of my life — most of the things I've gotten I don't deserve."