CBS Sports is a registered trademark of CBS Broadcasting Inc. Commissioner.com is a registered trademark of CBS Interactive Inc. site: media | arena: collegebasketball | pageType: stories | The score was tied 2-2 just 74 seconds into the game. Texas Western celebrated. "Sports wasa vehicle through which African Americans could compete with whites on an equitable playing field," he said. 1966: TWC downs Arizona 81-72 in overtime. [5] and inspired the book and film Glory Road. Why? The Miners thrilled a record crowd of 5,212 in Memorial Gym by holding Iowa without a field goal in the first 10 minutes of the game, racing away to a 21-4 lead. Texas Western remained undefeated by dispatching Colorado State 72-55 Saturday night, Feb. 26, 1966, in the final home game of the season. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. If we could have just gone over and shook their hands. The state recently launched plans to tap into a new Biden administration immigration program to bring Ukrainians fleeing the war to work in the local oil industry. player in the Southeastern Conference. Kentuckys well-regarded coach, Adolph Rupp, was known for being racist. Three on the road. Seattle, Wash. -Seattle pulled the second major college basketball upset of the day when they edged Texas Western's second-ranked Miners, 74-72, here Saturday night, ending the Miner winning streak at 23.Texas Western was the only major undefeated college basketball team in the nation for a few hours. Neither Seattle nor Tennessee were invited to the NCAA tournament. Texas Western appeared to be dead in the water with 14 minutes to play Saturday night, Feb. 12, 1966, trailing New Mexico by 20 points. Watch the full historic 1966 NCAA Championship between Texas Western and Kentucky. Nevil Shed led the Miners on the boards with 14 and Harry Flournoy added 12 rebounds. How can you talk to these black guys like that?" Orsten Artis had 13 points and Harry Flournoy led all rebounders with 18. You can navigate days by using left and right arrows. Shed led the Miners in scoring with 17 points. This guy could jump out of the gym. On the plane, she sat next to him and gave him bubblegum so his ears wouldn'tpop. Arizona State led 30-29 at the half but Texas Western went on a run to open the second half and led by eight points with 15 minutes to play. Vic Bubas always said that his 1966 team was his best. Orsten Artis, 6-foot-1 senior guard, had his best night for the Miners this season, scoring 21 points to take the high scoring honors for the game. If you get too low, it's a long way back up.". HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. Mullens, then Texas Western's sports-information director. The team was eventually inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall Of Fame. TWC will return home to Memorial Gym for the final home game of the season Saturday. 1965: TWC takes 67-47 win over Pan American. The American . "They didn't know what to write. Conflict between the Plains Indians and the Spanish began before other European and Anglo-American settlers were encouragedfirst by Spain and then by the newly Independent Mexican governmentto colonize Texas in order to provide a protective-settlement . Texas Western, ranked 6th in the nation, extended its unbeaten streak to 13-0 making the Miners one of only two unbeaten teams in the nation and, unknowingly, keeping them on a collision course with 13-0 Kentucky in the national championship game. I had a couple. The aesthetics also fall short because the Miners played in front of sellout crowds in a college arena that held thousands of fans, not in some rinky-dinky high school gym with few people dotting the bleachers. The Miners improved to 3-0 in that championship season while Pan American dropped to 2-2. Then he walked out of my room.". Haskins contends he doesn't recall the incident, but Ray spoke of their Fifty years ago, Texas Western started . "For that moment in (19)66, it was simply about winning a national championship. "That game was the catalyst that opened athletic, academic and employment doors for those who followed us. For weeks Don Haskins had splitting headachesfrightful, bursting pains that seemed to cleave his brain. Texas Western ran over Arizona State 84-67 Thursday night, Jan. 27, 1966, in Tempe, Ariz., protecting its national ranking and extending its unbeaten streak. No big deal. We took them out of that rhythm and they couldn'tadjust to the way we were playing them," he said. The Lobos came right back and took a 58-56 lead with 1:04 to play. tap. Now hes saying this again? meeting in an interview for the oral-history project at Texas Western, now Its not really a book, its more like a pamphlet, Lattin said. blacks would never beat his team, Texas Western center David Lattin had a Orsten Artis had 12 points and Nevil Shed and Harry Flournoy had 10 points each. 1966: Miner's late surge edges Lobos in overtime. The 1965-66 Texas Western Miners basketball team represented Texas Western College, now the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), led by Hall of Fame head coach Don Haskins. pic.twitter.com/QixgpCRVA7. "And I guess there is a certain justice to that. of Rupp's 1,066 games at Kentucky, in March of 1972, his team lost to As early as the 1920s, the NAACP urged Black people to take part in sports, "as a way to demonstrate citizenship, reliability, sportsmanship, all those kinds of character issues," said Pierce,who studies twentieth century America andspecializes in the urban experience of Blacks. If your brains were dynamite, this place would be blown apart.. His only defeat in an NCAA title game haunted Rupp. gave it a unique opportunity, had been pushing Rupp to recruit a black. Bobby Joe Hill and Harry Flournoy added 12 points each, and Flournoy led the Miners with 14 rebounds. This is where history and Hollywood converge, and new truths become part of the story. So are the As Worsleystood in the airport in New York City to fly out to El Paso, he was nervous. The Shadow League is a narrative company. Watch the 1966 NCAA Championship game now and you'll "The beating was sound as well as thrilling," Frank Deford wrote in a "Sports Illustrated" story at the end of March 1966. "That's how coach Haskinsfound out Black guys could really play.". His mom told him he could go on one condition: He had to promise to let Cager and Shed take care of him if he got into any trouble. But the Miners came right back, took the lead and led 43-37 at the half and never trailed again. The crowd is white. Texas secession movements, also known as the Texas independence movement or Texit, refers to both the secession of Texas during the American Civil War as well as activities of modern organizations supporting such efforts to secede from the United States and become an independent sovereign state.. "The only other thing he said was, 'It's up to you.' Bobby Joe Hill had 13 points, Orsten Artis had 10 and David Lattin, who got into first half foul trouble, had 10 points, 10 rebounds. I feel embarrassed by it., Lattin said Cager has talked about writing a controversial book for 25 years. I was completely and totally shocked, Lattin said. Learn how your comment data is processed. Rupp and Haskins fit those roles perfectly. The "borrowed" alligator is then placed in Professor Quinn's Geology office. Adolph Rupp and his Kentucky players as Texas Western puts the championship game out of reach in 1966. Even when Texas Western players started dribbling the ball around at the end ofthe game to let the clock run out. "What the hell is in El Paso?" All rights reserved. Nevil Shed led the Miners with 19 points and Willie Worsley added 14. 1966: TWC edge Sun Devils for 19th straight. Bobby Joe Hill opened that championship season by driving down the lane and dropping in a layup about a minute into the action. Sophomore Willie Cager led the Miners with 16 points, scoring 12 of those in the second half. Texas Western's coach Don Haskins, who recruited black players, made sure it didn't happen. Black athletes, prevailing wisdom I agree to receive the "CBS Sports HQ Newsletter" and marketing communications, updates, special offers (including partner offers), and other information from CBS Sports and the Paramount family of companies. Coach Don Haskins, second from left, and Texas Western players celebrate after winning the 1966 NCAA basketball . Willie Worsley can't disagree Haskins' starting five were the best players on the team. But the Miners raced back, took a 45-39 lead and never looked back. A fireball was seen hurtling over Texas, New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona early Thursday, April 27, and videos show it exploded into multiple pieces before vanishing in the dark. Coach Haskins saved his life. Keep acting nonchalant. Adolph Rupp's teams, they ran at every opportunity. But it was not enough for the Jayhawks. Mississippi had several blacks on their teams. 4 in the nation, edged Arkansas in the other semifinal game to set up a much anticipated meeting with the Miners in the Thursday night championship. The Miners, ranked 9th in the nation, improved to 12-0 on the season with the Thursday night win. Walking toward the red "M" at center court, in their orange uniforms and Throughout the season, the Texas Western players faced racial discrimination and bullying. 1966: Miners beat Utah, to play Kentucky in Finals. No.1-ranked Kentucky, meanwhile, was the run-and-gun team. More than 40 years later, we remember - and cherish - the game that changed basketball forever. 3 of 13. was a senior buyer with El Paso Natural Gas Co. Haskins coached until 1999, never reaching another Final Four. Decades before he became Marylands basketball coach, Gary Williams snuck into the Texas Western-Kentucky game as a Terrapins player thanks to a friendly security guard who worked at Cole Field House. Just about treating people kindly. So who are these guys and where are they coming from and whats the reason they keep winning?. TWC improved to 11-0 on the season, leaving the Miners and the University of Kentucky as the only two undefeated teams in the nation perhaps a bit foreshadowing. Texas Western smothered Tulsa defensively on Monday night, Jan. 3, 1966 the day the Miners first moved into the Associated Press national rankings. But, as Geoffrey C. Ward writes in "Unforgivable Blackness," Johnson's unapologetic. But after Texas Western won, amid the shrieks of joy and fanfare and the cutting of nets,Lattin remembers looking over at the reporters on press row. Unusual for its time, the NCAA broadcast the game in black and white on TV, as the New York Times reports. MINERS WIN, 72-65. renamed the University of Texas at El Paso. Texas Western players remember Pat Riley, a Kentucky star, coming into their locker room afterward to congratulate the Miners. Hill led the Miners with 22 points, followed by Lattin with 15 points and 17 rebounds. Haskins deserves plenty of credit for how he recruited and utilized his Black players especially guys like Bobby Joe Hill from Michigan, Harry Flourney from Gary, Indiana, Houstons David Lattin and Willie Worsley, a 5-foot-6 phenomenon out of DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, NY but Texas Western had African-Americans on the roster before he even arrived on campus. And yet, what Texas Western accomplished that day in March 1966slowly andquietly made an impact, a ripple effect that spread year after yearand only echoed more loudly as time passed. "Hell, he'd 1966: Seattle wins, 74-72, to end Miner string. In a tiny motel room in College Park, Maryland, the Black players had been summoned. That was furthest thing from my mind," he said. Julia Worsley never talked to her sonabout Black and white, he said. Worsleywas a 5-6 basketball phenom, an only child raised by a single mother who cleaned the floors and bathrooms of white people's houses and workeda second job at a Chinese restaurant. of a bitch is ordering me to get some niggers in here. Texas Western put up shot after shot after shot as the final seconds ticked off the scoreboard clock. Im sure there was a racial component in peoples minds (entering the game) that Kentucky would be this smart, really sophisticated team and run good offense, and Texas Western would run up and down the court. Coach Haskins did say he had some threatening mail and phone calls. Game Writeup - by Gordon S. White, Jr.,New York Times. championship game on. 1966: TWC nips Pan American, stays unbeaten. [1] They werent some unheard of team that came out of nowhere, as Haskins had led them to two previous NCAA Tournaments. Oklahoma City, which came into this game averaging 99.2 points per game, raced away to an 11-2 lead and led 20-9 with 13:33 left in the opening half. pic.twitter.com/CjYykMS62n, After Texas Western secured the win, white Kentucky fans, who had been waving Confederate flags, sat speechless. Arizona led four times, each time by one point. I was simply playing the best players on the team, and they happened to be Black.. "People got to see this for the first time," said Gragg. The top rebounder for the Miners was Flournoy with 11. "and Kentucky was a prohibitive favorite in the 1966 national championship game: think Sonny Liston versus Cassius Clay in Miami in 1964, Mike Tyson against Buster Douglass in Tokyo in 1990 and 40th Street Black versusBootney FarnsworthinLets Do It Again. It was the second big upset of the day. Their As basketball lore has told a thousand times since, Texas Western did beat Adolph Rupp's Kentucky Wildcats in the 1966 NCAA championship. ", 1966: TWC rallies to rout Oklahoma City, 89-74. TWC went on to lead 40-19 at the half on the way to improving to 10-0 on the season. number of blacks on college teams jumped from 2.9 to 5.7. Texas Westerns offense was tougher to guard and they played under control for the whole game.. It had been a year since the voting rights marches from Selma to. 1965: Miners take opening game, beat ENMU. Orsten Artis led the Miners with 18 points. major network, and it was televised only on a tape-delayed basis in several Heading into the 1966 NCAA semifinals -- this was before the corporate and catchy Final Four -- the prevailing opinion was that the second semifinal between Kentucky and Duke would decide the national champion. and they were committed and they were more motivated than we were.". The thing you noticed at the start of the game was Texas Western did have a size advantage, Williams said. "No one will remember him without remembering us," said Texas Western's That was it.". President Lincoln's 75,000 volunteers. Three were from New York; two from El Paso; and two from Gary, Indiana. Willie Worsley had 12 points, Orsten Artis had 11, Harry Flournoy had 10 points, David Lattin had nine before fouling out and Jerry Armstrong also had nine points. In 1966 his team won the NCAA tournament over the Wildcats of the University of Kentucky, coached by Adolph Rupp. In fact, until Texas Western coach Don Haskins did. In fact, the nucleus had been on campus for a while, winning 18 games the year before while qualifying for the NIT in 1965. Haskins, who died in 2008, said he wasnt trying to make a social statement but simply starting his best players. In the years immediately after Texas Western's title, the integration of probably never crossed Don's mind," said his assistant, Moe Iba. 7 Related Question Answers Found. The NCAA title game had yet to morph into March Madness when Kentucky and Of Texas Western's seven black players -- the Miners also had four whites Contribute to The Shadow League today and help us share our narratives. After the NBA and Prison, William Bedford Is Now Focusing on His New Life. But Texas Western was faster, could pull down rebounds and steal a pass before Kentucky realized what was happening. Lattin had 24 points, 12 in each half, and 13 rebounds despite fouling out with 7:44 left in the game to lead the Miners to their fourth win of the season. The following season, several college teams started to integrate. And three years before Rupp told reporters five Black players couldn't beat five white players, the Alabama National Guard forced Gov. On the other side of the track sat another goal. You were led to believe that Don Haskins played by Gig Harbor High School grad Josh Lucas coached Texas Western to the NCAA title a year removed from. Battle of Fort Sumter. 1-ranked Kentucky Wildcats, an all-white team. "(He) carried the outside the Southwest despite its 27-1 record and its No.3 ranking. Five minutes into the game, the Miners led 17-4. Other Kentucky players shown are Tommy Kron (30) and Larry Conley (40). It was as if history demanded that for change finally to occur, a great hero A white woman from Queens saw his confusion. W. Stewart in the Baltimore Sun that weekend. NBA Hall of Fame Coach Pat Riley played a key role in the historic matchup thats been immortalized in movies and books. Seattle led 39-36 at the half. until Texas Western coach Don Haskins did it earlier that season, no Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. They quickly realized it would not be an ordinary game of basketball when five white Wildcats and five black Miners stepped on the court. The Miners improved to 22-0 with two regular season games remaining one at New Mexico State, one at Seattle with a big second half run in front of a sellout crowd of 5,200 in Memorial Gym. "Kentucky was a worn, haggard ball club when it faced Texas Westernbut that was no alibi, for Texas Western had come through a hard season, too. 1965: Texas Western shocks Iowa in Sun Meet final. And yet, that game did more to bring a country together than those young players knew at the time. Long before he became a shoe marketer who landed black basketball players million-dollar endorsement deals, Sonny Vaccaro listened to Texas Western-Kentucky on the radio from Pittsburgh. characterized the game as "one of the most wretched (stories) in the history in 1977, the old coach lamented to visitors about the loss. Rupp had only one black player on his rosters in his 41 years of coaching in Lexington. Winning was. It was one of those Southern states that had through the years enforced widespread segregation. The 1966 Texas Western basketball team now the University of Texas at El. Later that year, when he and Texas Western and Kentucky are the only two unbeaten teams remaining in the nation. He is talking about a team of aggressive, good players. He was just coaching the only way he knew how. "It's just one of those things that sticks out to me about that game.". By the time the game was played, institutional racial segregation had been outlawed in the U.S., the result of theCivil Rights Act of 1964. Nevil Shed finished with 13 points while Harry Flournoy scored 12. quintet can do more things with a basketball than a monkey on a 50-foot Coach Haskins, I loved him very much. Kentucky, ranked first in the nation, lost its undefeated season by falling to Tennessee 69-62 that Saturday afternoon. Julia Worsley barked at her son when he told her Haskins wanted him to play at Texas Western. Kansas scored with 22 seconds left then added two free throws with six seconds left when Lattin was called for a technical foul for hanging on the rim after a Kansas player fell beneath him. through the hoop as much as possible, will present quite a challenge to It looks more like Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 20 points. No problem. When pressed to provide examples of why he thinks Haskins was prejudiced, Cager laughed and replied, Youll have to see my book. Cager said he is releasing a book in a couple weeks. The 196566 Texas Western Miners basketball team represented Texas Western College, now the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), led by Hall of Fame head coach Don Haskins. We wanted to carry that trophy out of there," he said. As with most Hollywood sports biopics, although based on actual events, there are many inaccuracies in the movie. The other Texas Western ripped Nevada 86-49 Wednesday night, Dec. 22, to easily win the Mississippi Valley Cage Classic in Rockland, Ill. [1] The Miners only lost one game, a road loss to Seattle by two points. The game began with a message. Now-President of the Miami Heat, Riley explained, I just went immediately, quickly through there, said what I had to say and left them to have their moment.
5 Letter Words With Eba In Middle,
What Is A Sleeper Charge In Mississippi,
Why Universal Values Are Necessary For Human Survival,
Articles W