Bobby Joe Hill had 17, Cager had 15 and Orsten Artis had 11 points to pace TWC. It turned out to be one of the greatest nights in the history of college sports. Their But even as the jubilant Miners celebrated a new set of myths was emerging. Texas Western, playing its third game in six days, traveling from Tucson to Albuquerque and back to Memorial Gym, edged Arizona State 69-67 Monday night, Feb. 14, 1966. "You can't measure the importance of this game and the outcome of it.". 1965: TWC takes 67-47 win over Pan American. TWC held the Chiefs to just 37.3 percent shooting and outrebounded them 40-32. The Shadow League is a narrative company. David Lattin had 14 points, seven rebounds. Orsten Artis had 15 points, eight rebounds. Haskins stormed in, smelling of the cigarettes he'd smoked that day. During Black History Month, with the series 28 Black Stories in 28 days, USA TODAY Sports examines the issues, challenges and opportunities Black athletes and sports officials face after the nations reckoning on race in 2020. The further we got away from the game, the more it was talked about.. Thats when people started talking about it, Lattin said. It's true, Texas Western, ranked No. The NCAA title game had yet to morph into March Madness when Kentucky and Fifty years later, the tributes to Texas Western (now known as the University of Texas-El Paso) keep coming. That was exciting for him to do that, Armstrong said. Adolph Rupp and his Kentucky players as Texas Western puts the championship game out of reach in 1966. Jerry Armstrong came off the bench to defend and slow Jerry Chambers and help the Miners reach Saturday night's championship game against No. Kentucky was all-white again. The other The 1965-66 Texas Western Miners basketball team was headed by Hall of Fame head coach Don Haskins and represented Texas Western College, now the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP). "I kind of understoodwhat we were getting into.". "What a piece of history. 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. Later that year, when he and When you do something for someone else, its a legacy that lasts forever.. court, he confronted his two guards about the steals," recalled Eddie It didn't win as many games as his . Unusual for its time, the NCAA broadcast the game in black and white on TV, as the New York Times reports. I was ready to play that game. 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. TWC held for the last shot but Bobby Joe Hill was called for charging with seven seconds left. Black players were no longer taboo, and basketball was never the same. The game began with a message. "(Lattin) said, `Take that you white honky,'" recalled Riley. One slight still bothers some Texas Western players about 1966: They didnt visit the White House and appear on the Ed Sullivan Show like past NCAA champions. Joseph Ray tried to move Haskins in the opposite direction. 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. READ MORE: Linda Brown From Historic Brown v. Board Case Passes Away. But, as Geoffrey C. Ward writes in "Unforgivable Blackness," Johnson's unapologetic. If you get too low, it's a long way back up.". Who did the Texas Western Miners lose to Seattle or Tulsa? Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. 1966: TWC, Cincinnati defense to clash in NCAA. characterized the game as "one of the most wretched (stories) in the history 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. time, they would somehow revert to their native impulses.". Enter a date in the format M/D (e.g., 1/1), Texas Western defeats Kentucky in NCAA final, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/texas-western-defeats-kentucky-in-ncaa-finals, Elvis Presley puts a down payment on Graceland, Bodies found in Yosemite serial killer case. 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. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), Current one is: March 19. The squad also had four Anglo-Americans (Jerry Armstrong, Louis Baudoin, Dick Meyers, and Togo Railey and one Mexican-American Dave Palacio). "'I wish I could have done one thing and I didnt do it. The 1966 Texas Western basketball team now the University of Texas at El. blacks at home. President Lincoln's 75,000 volunteers. Your email address will not be published. Determined to put an end to it, Haskins fielded an all-black team on that fateful night. What am I going to The Miners, ranked 9th in the nation, improved to 12-0 on the season with the Thursday night win. He was one of them. just 38 percent. Texas Western took an early lead and never relinquished it on its way to a national championship. David Lattin led the Miners with 29 points. championship. Adolph Rupp and Don Haskins were both prejudiced, but (Haskins) decided to play the black players and he did it and, bottom line, it worked.. renamed the University of Texas at El Paso. Shed had 11 and Harry Flournoy had 10 points, 10 rebounds. Their tenacity paid off, and Texas Western won the game 72 - 65. The Miners again used their lockdown defense and rebounded with a fury, outrebounding Nevada 59-25. The team was presented with keys to the city of El Paso. And those letters from the whites in the south, you can just imagine what they said. And yet, that game did more to bring a country together than those young players knew at the time. In 1966, American cultural and sporting mythology insisted at least one blacks would never beat his team, Texas Western center David Lattin had a But Hill hit a long jumper and Shed dropped in a layup and the Miners never trailed again. The Miners led almost the entire game, leading by seven points twice in the first half and leading by as many as six in the second half. For weeks Don Haskins had splitting headachesfrightful, bursting pains that seemed to cleave his brain. That win accelerated the advancement of black athletes in the South. The watershed game highlighted the end of racial segregation in college basketball. In the years immediately after Texas Western's title, the integration of all-white again. Rupp, stunned college basketball and upset conventional wisdom. The Miners improved to 7-0 on the 1965-66 season by dominating South Dakota 88-42 in the tournament's semifinals. Why? 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. He is talking about a team of aggressive, good players. Willie Worsley led the Miners in scoring, hitting from the outside and finishing with 18 points. Princeton-Dartmouth on a Friday night in January. The 1965-66 Texas Western Miners basketball team represented Texas Western College, now known as the University of Texas El Paso (UTEP). It still matters because race is still prevalent in the American eye.. Haskins replied, Same way I do white guys.. Essentially, the final game pitted Kentucky's offense against Texas Western's defense, and it was the defense that held up.". Copyright 2023 Endgame360 Inc. All Rights Reserved. Ray suggested Rupp, who retired in 1972 with a 876-190 record, won four national championships and one NIT title. In fact, until Texas Western coach Don Haskins did. Texas Western ripped Nevada 86-49 Wednesday night, Dec. 22, to easily win the Mississippi Valley Cage Classic in Rockland, Ill. And, of course, the Miner defense was in full fury, holding South Dakota to just 23.8 percent shooting. Back then, there were very few games on TV. That was it.". 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. basketball at the time, but the ideal foils for Haskins and Texas Western. He and his all-white Kentucky program were not only the epitome of college have to change or become increasingly noncompetitive nationally," wrote "You meet the same people going up you meet on the way back down," she told him. As Worsleystood in the airport in New York City to fly out to El Paso, he was nervous. George Wallace to end his blockade so Black students could enroll at Alabama. "(Rupp) jumped up and called timeout, (and) as they were coming off the 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]. The U.S. Constitution does not specifically address the secession of states, and the issue was a . Nevil Shed finished with 13 points while Harry Flournoy scored 12. The opening game in Wichita will pit Colorado State and the University of Houston. Texas Western and Kentucky are the only two unbeaten teams remaining in the nation. W. Stewart in the Baltimore Sun that weekend. The duel was breath taking Texas Western 69, Kansas 69 at the end of regulation; TWC 71, Kansas 71 at the end of the first overtime. For several years Kentucky president John W. player, Tom Payne. By William Gildea. But in the south, it was still rare to find a college sports team that wasn't all white. Otherwise, Miners players said there was no racial tension. Harry Flournoy. 1966: TWC beats NM Aggies 104-78, win 15th. "The running, gunning Texas 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. The Miners improved to 14-0 with the win and joined Kentucky as the only two undefeated teams in the nation. One year before Texas Western won theNCAA title against Kentucky, 72-65, John Lewis led more than 600 people on a 54-mile march from Selma, Alabama, to the state capitol in Montgomery. Texas Western led 32-27 at the half and held on to a 60-59 lead with 1:56 to play. 1966: TWC smack Chiefs, continue winning streak. The Miners advanced to play Kansas Saturday night, March 12, 1966, in the Midwest Regional finals. memory of that game to his grave," wrote his biographer, Russell Rice. Cager scored in the lane, was fouled and made the free throw to put the Miners up 74-70 in overtime. Willie Worsley can't disagree Haskins' starting five were the best players on the team. 1966: Miner's late surge edges Lobos in overtime. For the next four years he was at Texas Western, the woman would pick up Worsley every Sunday from campus and take him to her house for dinner. championship game on. Artis made seven-of-eight shots from the field and four-for-four from the free throw line. "Even coach.". Mullens, then Texas Western's sports-information director. Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on Twitter: @DanaBenbow. Kentucky, ranked first in the nation, lost its undefeated season by falling to Tennessee 69-62 that Saturday afternoon. On February 6, 2016, the now University Of Texas El Paso Miners held a reunion for the 1966 players at the Don Haskins Center. Orsten Artis had 14 points, seven rebounds and Willie Worsley had 14 points and Harry Flournoy had seven rebounds. In fact, Wallace, who a year later at Vanderbilt became the first black basketball Nevil Shed intercepted an in-bounds pass and dropped in a lay-up and the two teams went into overtime, knotted at 58-58. The Miners improved to 26-1 on the season with the win over Kansas while the Jayhawks ended their season at 23-4. Here's how I saw history. Texas Western held off a stiff challenge from Pan American Saturday night, Feb. 19, 1966, taking a 65-61 win in front of 1,400 fans in Edinburg, Texas. 1965: TWC wins Mississippi Valley Classic. It looks more like And three years before Rupp told reporters five Black players couldn't beat five white players, the Alabama National Guard forced Gov. They were basketball players, who were still pretty single-minded, focused on basketball. The Wildcats were coached by the legendary Adolph Rupp aka The Baron Of Bluegrass and led by All-American guards Pat Riley and Louie Dampier. Haskins contends he doesn't recall the incident, but Ray spoke of their Kentuckywas quick and hadn't had much trouble with teams throughout the season. Bobby Joe Hill had 20 points and Orsten Artis added 18. I was very disappointed we didnt go to the White House or Ed Sullivan. "The legend of Texas Western: journalism and the epic sports spectacle that wasnt. It led to the integration of college sports. Walking toward the red "M" at center court, in their orange uniforms and Iowa, ranked No. Orsten Artis had 13 points and Harry Flournoy led all rebounders with 18. He was so good. Bobby Joe Hill had 18, Willie Worsley 12 and David Lattin had 11. As Texas Western, the Miners won the 1966 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament. But the Miner defense held the Golden Hurricane scoreless for almost five minutes and that led to a 38-25 TWC halftime lead. The Miners improved to 3-0 in that championship season while Pan American dropped to 2-2. Get their watches. But Texas Western was faster, could pull down rebounds and steal a pass before Kentucky realized what was happening. 2023 www.indystar.com. The win improved the Miner record to 24-1 and propelled them into the NCAA Midwest Regional Friday night, March 11 against the University of Cincinnati in Lubbock. The American . 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. The game was played during an era of racial unrest and as the civil rights movement was gaining power. In 2006, the movie Glory Road, depicting the significance of this game, was released. 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. 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. That move by a bearish white man didn't come without controversy. David Lattin added 11 points and Bobby Joe Hill had 10. A crowd of 7,800, featuring many Miner fans, watched the game in the Lubbock Municipal Auditorium. But what Haskins did was key, saidRichard Pierce, a professor and historian at the University of Notre Dame. Nevil Shed led the Miners with 19 points and Willie Worsley added 14. all black. The two teams finished regulation tied at 67-67. On this date in 1966: Texas Western becomes the first team to start five black players in the NCAA national championship.The Miners beat Adolph Rupps all-white No.

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