It was the first time a starting five of all-Black players had won the title. After Texas Western beat Utah in the first semifinal, Lattin rushed out to watch Kentucky-Duke. David Lattin led TWC with 14 points, 11 rebounds. Essentially, the final game pitted Kentucky's offense against Texas Western's defense, and it was the defense that held up.". Texas Western improved to 6-0 on the season while Fresno State, which came into this two-game series at 5-1, dropped to 5-3 on the season. And what they did that night has resonated for 50 years since.. The 1966 Texas Western roster included seven African-Americans, four whites and one Hispanic player: Bobby Joe Hill, David Lattin, Orsten Artis, Nevil Shed, Harry Flournoy, Willie Worsley, Willie Cager, Louis Baudoin, Jerry Armstrong, David Palacio, Dick Myers and Togo Railey. quintet can do more things with a basketball than a monkey on a 50-foot SHAPIRO: Texas Western is now known as the University of Texas at El Paso, and Andrade Franco says that historic team is a point of pride for his city. Hopelessly outclassed (by Rupp's pristine Kentucky program)." The game was played during an era of racial unrest and as the civil rights movement was gaining power. Here's how I saw history. Willie Worsley had 14, Bobby Joe Hill 13 and Willie Cager 10 points to pace the Miners. What happened to the 1966 Texas Western basketball team? Even Texas Western players remain amazed theyre still remembered 50 years later. Mullens, then Texas Western's sports-information director. The Miners advanced to play Kansas Saturday night, March 12, 1966, in the Midwest Regional finals. We publish narratives intentionally and specifically to enlighten and transform the world. Rupp, stunned college basketball and upset conventional wisdom. David Lattin added 11 points and Bobby Joe Hill had 10. History of Texas - Wikipedia Claiborne, who was Dukes first black basketball player and became a business professor at Texas Southern. ESPN Classic - Texas Western's 1966 title left lasting legacy would dissolve into chaos. do?". Orsten Artis led Texas Western with 18 points, followed by Bobby Joe Hill with 15, Willie Worsley with 14 and David Lattin with 10. It was a special beginning to a special season. in 1977, the old coach lamented to visitors about the loss. When the game was over and Texas Western was thevictor, the players didn't shake hands. Williams wanted to see the mystique of Kentucky firsthand and he was curious about the Miners since virtually no one outside of El Paso, Texas, had seen them play. Finally, after two overtime and tons of tension, Texas Western edged Kansas 81-80 in front of 8,200 breathless fans in Lubbock Memorial Auditorium on Saturday night, March 12, 1966. Texas-Indian wars - Wikipedia 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. Bobby Joe Hill, the Miner point guard, picked up three fouls early and had to sit for 13 minutes in the first half. 1-ranked Kentucky Wildcats, an all-white team. The Texas-Indian wars were a series of conflicts between settlers in Texas and the Southern Plains Indians during the 19th-century. But Texas Western was faster, could pull down rebounds and steal a pass before Kentucky realized what was happening. The Miners never trailed and led this game 45-21 at the half on their way to setting up a meeting with Nevada in Wednesday night's championship game. Three were from New York; two from El Paso; and two from Gary, Indiana. He said it was probably the worst day of his life when he lost that game, but he felt the right team won because it did so much for others. The U.S. Constitution does not specifically address the secession of states, and the issue was a . Riley has one regret about that game, and it's not the loss. blacks continued to start for the Miners. In a 1991 Sports Illustrated article commemorating the 25th anniversary of the game, author Curry Kirkpatrick described Haskins screaming at one of his black players, Bobby Joe Hill, and sitting him out of practice the day before the 1966 NCAA semifinals. player in the Southeastern Conference. But even as the jubilant Miners celebrated a new set of myths was emerging. 1 person. W. Stewart in the Baltimore Sun that weekend. After the NBA and Prison, William Bedford Is Now Focusing on His New Life. The Texas Western Miners did make history, with an all-black starting five winning the national title in 1966. Miami Heat President Pat Riley Reflects on 50th Anniversary of Texas quasi-professionals imported from Northern cities to win Haskins a Willie Cager scored six of Texas Western's nine overtime points to lead the Miners past Cincinnati Friday night, March 11, 1966, in Lubbock. READ MORE: Linda Brown From Historic Brown v. Board Case Passes Away. 196566 Texas Western Miners men's basketball team, Texas Western Miners basketball 196566 NCAA champions, NCAA Division I men's basketball champions, Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, "Texas Western defeats Kentucky in NCAA final", "Hill and friends flummox favored Kentucky by 72-65", Wayland Baptist Women's Teams (19481982), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=196566_Texas_Western_Miners_men%27s_basketball_team&oldid=1146686586, 196566 NCAA University Division men's basketball independents season, NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament championship seasons, NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament Final Four seasons, 1966 NCAA University Division basketball tournament participants, Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Hutchison, Phillip. Orsten Artis led the Miners with 22 points. "It's just one of those things that sticks out to me about that game.". It never dawned on me the social significance that it was until after the fact., Today, Vaccaro views Texas Western-Kentucky as the most significant game in basketball history. A tight-knit group of blacks, whites and one Hispanic, the Miners played their way to the NCAA championship game against Adolph Rupp's No. That move by a bearish white man didn't come without controversy. The Broncos did not pick up their last two points until making a pair of free throws with one second remaining in the game. The Miners, ranked 9th in the nation, improved to 12-0 on the season with the Thursday night win. The Wildcats were the favorite to win, despite the Miners 23-0 season. Whether it happened or not, five Worsley said he never felt any discrimination being Black in college. Blacks now were recruited as reserves as well as starters. Ten players in laughably short pants move slowly through 40 minutes of Its idiotic. basketball at the time, but the ideal foils for Haskins and Texas Western. As Worsleystood in the airport in New York City to fly out to El Paso, he was nervous. There was so little madness surrounding the On this date in 1966, Texas Western (now called UTEP) becomes the first team to start 5 African-Americans in the NCAA Tournament title game, beating a Kentucky team (72-65) that included Pat Riley. Bobby Joe Hill offered a bit of foreshadowing for that championship game against Kentucky, picking off four steals from East Texas and turning each one into an easy, uncontested layup in front of 3,800 fans in Memorial Gym. Harry Flournoy scored nine points in the first half, seven more in the second half to lead the Miners with 16 points. Your email address will not be published. "We didn't see Black and white. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. "You know what I was thinking about? 1966: TWC beats ASU, 84-67, breaks Tempe jinx. "Still, I'd seen enough," said Lattin, who went on to later write thebook "Slam Dunk to Glory." 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. "I had it pretty good," he said. The Miners led 40-33 at the half and their defense simply smothered the Sun Devils holding them to just 39.1 percent shooting from the floor and forcing 23 turnovers. They hadjust finished their pregame meal and Texas Western coach Don Haskins had corneredhis big center David Lattin with a demand. section: | slug: significance-of-texas-westerns-1966-ncaa-title-not-realized-at-first | sport: collegebasketball | route: article_single.us | They cruised on to take a 40-26 halftime lead. Fine, Hill! Haskins shouted, according to the story. The Miners went out that night and beat a very good Tulsa team 63-54 in front of 5,000 fans in Memorial Gym. All-white leagues like the Atlantic Coast Conference, Southwestern Conference, and Southeastern Conference became integrated within the next two years. They never trailed again. Texas Western's coach Don Haskins, who recruited black players, made sure it didn't happen. The Story Behind A Rap About The 1966 Texas Western Team Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners offensively with 19 points. "(He said) `You The Team - University of Texas at El Paso Required fields are marked *. Later that year, when he and Otherwise, Miners players said there was no racial tension. This guy could jump out of the gym. 1966 NCAA tournament: Bracket, scores, stats, records It was March 19, 1966, the night a team with five black starters made history by winning a national championship. David Lattin had 16 points, 12 rebounds, Nevil Shed had 12 points, 10 rebounds and Harry Flournoy had 12 rebounds. In 2006, the movie Glory Road, depicting the significance of this game, was released. In the 60s, many people believed black men would not be able to handle the pressure of playing at a collegiate level. Their But does the film ("Glory Road" is being released by Disney, the parent company of . What am I going to Mississippi had several blacks on their teams. After the NCAA championship, Haskins received more than 40,000 pieces of hate mail for starting five Black players, he latertold theL.A. Times. 1966: Miners beat Utah, to play Kentucky in Finals. 69 Texas Western 1966 Premium High Res Photos The Miners improved to 26-1 on the season with the win over Kansas while the Jayhawks ended their season at 23-4. Keep acting nonchalant. Why? Orsten Artis led the Miners with 18 points. Meanwhile, though it was never mentioned until decades later, by the "I call it a watershed moment in college athletics. Copyright 2023 Endgame360 Inc. All Rights Reserved. Learn how your comment data is processed. Harry Flournoy. knew nothing about the team but its curious racial makeup helped sustain The score was tied at 72-72 with two minutes to play. Nevada edged Creighton 97-96 in double overtime in the other semifinal game. Texas Western survived a scare Thursday night, Feb. 10, 1966, edging Arizona 81-72 in overtime in front of an overflow crowd at Memorial Gym. "That's how coach Haskinsfound out Black guys could really play.". college sports took a great leap forward. 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. But it was on the boards that the Miners truly dominated this game. I got mail from Blacks, saying that I was exploiting Black kids,Haskins said. The crowd is white. He always blamed the loss on a flu bug, on inept shooting, on the referees, Theydid it againstKentucky's all-white squad. David Lattin and Nevil Shed had 14 points each. The shot was good but the trail official, right behind the play, signaled White was out of bounds. But, as Geoffrey C. Ward writes in "Unforgivable Blackness," Johnson's unapologetic. He is talking about a team of aggressive, good players. Four (Duke and Utah were the others)," said Texas Western guard Willie No longer would we be kept out of mainstream America.". Shed had 11 and Harry Flournoy had 10 points, 10 rebounds. That was about it. That shouldnt be significant one way or the other, except that many people make it noteworthy with snickers about the ethnic makeup of the team.. On the other side of the track sat another goal. cheated by using ineligible players. A crowd of 7,800, featuring many Miner fans, watched the game in the Lubbock Municipal Auditorium. The night before that team meeting of Black players in his motel room, Lattin sat at the Cole Field House with his team and watched the first half of the Kentucky-Duke game. Haskins coached until 1999, never reaching another Final Four. "That game was the catalyst that opened athletic, academic and employment doors for those who followed us. The team was coached by Hall of Famer Don Haskins. violent game. NCAA officials, the referees, the coaches, the cheerleaders and almost all In fact, The Miners improved to 20-0 on the season and coach Don Haskins got his 100th career victory against only 25 losses. A pool-shooting hustler from Enid, Okla., Haskins was a pragmatist on And yet, that game did more to bring a country together than those young players knew at the time. '", "The Miners, who don't worry much about defense but try to pour the ball The top rebounder for the Miners was Flournoy with 11. The Miners led by five with 1:17 to go in regulation but Kansas scrambled back to tie it 69-69 and force overtime. The movie Glory Road was so loose with facts that it trivializes the long road that it took to integrate the game and turns it into a sort of a fairy tale, Chicago Sun Times columnist Ron Rapoport told NPR in 2006. "`Nigger ball' they used to call it. Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 24 points. Three on the road. A brilliant show of basketball hijacking and broken-field driving by little Bobby Joe Hill eased his coach's aching head and took the Texas Western Miners to the national collegiate championship. This is where history and Hollywood converge, and new truths become part of the story. "Hell no. And so in that historic game that Lattinand his fellow players really didn't know was historic "we passed the ball a lot and we would shoot a lot. through the hoop as much as possible, will present quite a challenge to 2023 www.elpasotimes.com. "The running, gunning Texas Kentucky defeated Auburn 115-78 Saturday to improve to 14-0. players he did recruit -- like Kentuckians Butch Beard and Wes Unseld -- "He treated us all the same, like (expletive deleted)," said Worsley. This is the most important college game ever played? Go over and comfort each other," Riley said, not just about that game but about what he calls today's divided country. a rigidly patterned offense, "We were more white-oriented than any of the other teams in the Final 1965: Miners take opening game, beat ENMU. The closer Texas Western (see cover) came . Did The Flock Sign Him Or Does He Have A New Trolling Target. We wanted to carry that trophy out of there," he said. 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. "The legend of Texas Western: journalism and the epic sports spectacle that wasnt. Nevil Shed intercepted an in-bounds pass and dropped in a lay-up and the two teams went into overtime, knotted at 58-58. 1 Kentucky. Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 20 points. The game began with a message. Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 19 points. But the Miners came right back, took the lead and led 43-37 at the half and never trailed again. Confederate flag as the Wildcats' five white players line up for the opening player, Tom Payne. TWC held for the last shot but Bobby Joe Hill was called for charging with seven seconds left. All rights reserved. 5:57 pm ET. I wish at that time we could haveall just embraced each other.'". "Hell, he'd pic.twitter.com/QixgpCRVA7. At Northern colleges, where the unwritten rule for coaches had been, "Two The '66 team is inescapable in El Paso. The Miners were playing and winning their third road game in four outings on this Saturday night in south Texas. Texas Western, an independent from remote El Paso, was little known Texas Western defeats Kentucky in NCAA final - History That win accelerated the advancement of black athletes in the South. He loved us.". 2023, A&E Television Networks, LLC. On Saturday night, Dec. 18, 1965, the same two teams met again in Memorial Gym in front of 4,601 fans and a Miner team with Hill proved to be a very different team. Game Writeup - by Gordon S. White, Jr.,New York Times. When you do something for someone else, its a legacy that lasts forever.. The Miners beat Kentucky (an all-white program until 1969) 7265 in the historic championship game, played on Saturday, March 19, at Cole Field House on the University of Maryland campus in College Park, a suburb of Washington, D.C.[2][3][4]. I had a couple. Nevil Shed had 14 points, nine rebounds. Now hes saying this again? This was a landmark night and although the 1954 Brown vs Board of Education decision and Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed racial segregation in the public school system, it was still common to find all-white college sports teams, particularly in the South. "He came into the room and he said, 'Coach Rupp said in the press conference you couldn't beat five whiteguys,'" Lattin said this week. Texas Western, 19-0, and Kentucky, 20-0, were the only two undefeated teams in the nation at this point. But it was not enough for the Jayhawks. Texas Western ripped Nevada 86-49 Wednesday night, Dec. 22, to easily win the Mississippi Valley Cage Classic in Rockland, Ill. Harry Flournoy had a huge game with 14 points, 14 rebounds. The Miners improved to 14-0 with the win and joined Kentucky as the only two undefeated teams in the nation. The Miners again used their lockdown defense and rebounded with a fury, outrebounding Nevada 59-25. JoJo White rushed down the floor and heaved one up from the left side as time ran out. 1966: TWC, Cincinnati defense to clash in NCAA. Walt Wesley, the 6-foot-11 Kansas center, scored first in overtime but the Miners' David Lattin scored off a rebound with 3:02 to play, tying the game at 71-71. ESPN.com: Page 2 : Reel Life: 'Glory Road' "I was simply playing the best players on the team, and they happened to be Black.". College Basketball: NCAA Final Four, Texas Western coach Don Haskins in team huddle during game vs Utah, College Park, MD 3/18/1966 Harry Flournoy had 13 points, 17 rebounds and David Lattin managed 11 points, despite fouling out with 9:26 to play. The Miners, on the strength of their 86-68 win over No. 2 transfer Max Abmas commits to Texas. Still, Haskins took it a step further than schools in the south were doing and heplayed his Black players. Nevil Shed had 12 points, eight rebounds, and Willie Worsley had 10 points. The year after winning the title, the school became the University of Texas-El Paso (UTEP). The "borrowed" alligator is then placed in Professor Quinn's Geology office. Although the uprising was part of a larger one . UTEP honored the 1966 team earlier this month during a ceremony that includes messages from President Barack Obama, Nike co-founder Phil Knight, film producer Jerry Bruckheimer and ESPN commentator Dick Vitale. Throughout the season, the Texas Western players faced racial discrimination and bullying. "Without question, it was one of the most significant, impactful college sporting events in the history of our country.". characterized the game as "one of the most wretched (stories) in the history Seattle University held off the final Miner onslaught to defeat Texas Western 74-72 Saturday night, March 5, 1966, to end the undefeated season in front of 11,557 fans in Seattle. David Lattin had 16 points, nine rebounds. 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 . Elusive point guard Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 16 points, including four buckets on quick drives down the middle for layups. A crowd of 5,399 packed Memorial Gym and spilled over into the auxillary gym to watch on closed circuit television. What Texas Western's Black players and white coach did in 1966 Miami (Ohio) WBB coach resigns after investigation, Texas joins Top 25 And 1 after landing Abmas, Five-star prospect Ron Holland decommits from Texas, Ranking college basketball's top 40 transfers of 2023, No. championship game on. How many black players did Texas Western have on the team? The nationally ranked Hawkeyes dropped to 8-1 on the season. Throughout the season, the Texas Western players faced racial discrimination and bullying. Then he walked out of my room." As basketball lore has told a thousand times since, Texas Western did beat Adolph Rupp's Kentucky Wildcats in the 1966 NCAA championship. And four when behind", things changed David Lattin and Willie Worsley made free throws and Hill made a driving layup. gave it a unique opportunity, had been pushing Rupp to recruit a black. Reach her via email: dbenbow@indystar.com. 1965: TWC takes second win of young season. Colorado State, which has also already been selected for the NCAA Tournament, led the Miners by five, 37-32, with 15:04 to play in the game. Bobby Joe Hill led the Miners with 18 points. One of the reasons were still talking about it is something Pat Riley said one time, Lattin said. In the years immediately after Texas Western's title, the integration of time, they would somehow revert to their native impulses.". After the game, he refused to congratulate or shake hands with the players. In 1955, Texas Western was the first state college in Texas to integrate its undergraduate classes. This Day In 1966: Texas Western, featuring the first all-black starting lineup, beats Adolph Rupps Kentucky team to win NCAA title. Texas Western's five black starters didn't catch the eyes of the country until they went up against an all-white Adolph Rupp coached Kentucky team in the national championship. And, like all of coach 1966: TWC edge Sun Devils for 19th straight. "I kind of understoodwhat we were getting into.". All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. Bobby Joe Hill opened that championship season by driving down the lane and dropping in a layup about a minute into the action. Texas Western's Streak Is Over : NPR Basketball is long gone from Cole, which was built for boxing, became one of the most storied basketball arenas, and now is transitioning into a football indoor practice facility.
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