50 years later, Texas Western's win resonates off the court

palmbeachpost ^ | March 16, 2016 | Schuyler Dixon, John Zenor, Gary B, Graves, Betsy Blaney

[pilgrim]

MIAMI — The opposing team's locker room is a place Pat Riley has generally considered off-limits for almost all his basketball life: Do not enter except under extreme circumstances.

Fifty years ago was one of those circumstances.

FILE - In this March 19, 1966, file photo, Kentucky's Thad Jaracz (55) and Texas Western's David Latin (42) reach for a rebound during the first period of the NCAA men's baksetball championship game in College Park, Md. Other Kentucky players shown are Tommy Kron (30) and Larry Conley (40). Fifty years ago, Texas Western started five blacks–Willie Worsley, Orsten Artis, Bobby Joe Hill, David "Big Daddy" Lattin and Harry Flournoy–against Kentucky in the game. Today, after reading historical recaps and watching movies, people tend to think it was an immediate watershed moment in sports and civil rights. It wasn't. (AP Photo/File)

Riley and his teammates on Kentucky's all-white squad had just lost the national championship game to little Texas Western, which started five black players. It was a historic moment in both college basketball and U.S. race relations.

As he left the floor that day, Riley realized he had not shaken hands with the winners. So the Kentucky star found the nerve to venture into the Texas Western locker room.

"It was just joy," Riley recalled recently. "Just joy. Their players were in there, their families were in there. I just went immediately, quickly through there, said what I had to say and left them to have their moment. And what they did that night has resonated for 50 years since."

FILE - In this March 19, 1966, file photo, Kentucky's Tommy Kron, left, passes over Texas Western's David Lattin (42) to teammate Larry Conley (40) during the first half of the NCAA college basketball championship game at the University of Maryland, in College Park, Md. Behind Conley is Kentucky's Thad Jaraos (55). Fifty years ago, Texas Western started five blacks–Willie Worsley, Orsten Artis, Bobby Joe Hill, David "Big Daddy: Lattin and Harry Flournoy–against Kentucky. Today, after reading historical recaps and watching movies, people tend to think it was an immediate watershed moment in sports and civil rights. It wasn't. (AP photo/jr, File)

March 19, 1966. Texas Western 72, Kentucky 65. At the height of the civil rights movement, it was much more than a basketball game. Immortalized — and introduced, perhaps, to a new generation — through the movie "Glory Road" 10 years ago, the game marks its 50th anniversary during the opening weekend of this year's NCAA Tournament. And in all eight of the NCAA men's games that will be played on the actual anniversary date, black players and white players will compete alongside and against one another, not held back from attending a certain school because of the color of their skin.

FILE - In this March 19, 1966, file photo, Texas Western basketball coach Don Haskins, second from left, and players celebrate after winning the NCAA basketball championship in College Park, Md. Fifty years ago, Texas Western started five blacks–Willie Worsley, Orsten Artis , Bobby Joe Hill, David "Big Daddy" Lattin and Harry Flournoy–against Kentucky in the NCAA championship game. Today, after reading historical recaps and watching movies, people tend to think it was an immediate watershed moment in sports and civil rights. It wasn't. (AP Photo/File)

"The contributions that that team made and the way those guys stuck together — they're the reasons also why I have a job at the University of Alabama," said Crimson Tide coach Avery Johnson, a former NBA player. "And why a lot of these other African-American players around the country can go and play at these Division I schools and play in such a way that they don't have to look over their shoulders because of racial situations." Such is the legacy of what Texas Western did that night at Cole Field House in Maryland. By winning a game, they changed the game.

FILE - In this March 18, 1966, file photo, Texas Western coach Don Haskins, right, escorts Orsten Artis off the court after Texas Western defeated Utah in a semifinal in the NCAA men's college basketball tournament, at the University of Maryland, in College Park, Md. Texas Western won 85-78 with Artis leading his teammates with 22 points. Breaking down racial barriers wasn’t the only legacy left from the 1966 title game between Kentucky and Texas Western. The two coaches, Adolph Rupp and Don Haskins, were trailblazers who helped to revolutionize the way the game is played today. (AP Photo/File)

"I never felt that we were playing against five black players," said Riley, a winner of nine NBA titles and now president of the Miami Heat. "I don't know what they felt. Only now, 50 years later can maybe the truth come out and all of the thoughts come out about that night. It turned out to be a rather significant moment in African-American history from the standpoint of what it did for college basketball and the segregation and the integration part of it."

The latest data collected by Richard Lapchick and his Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport at the University of Central Florida showed that at the Division I men's level, more than 57 percent of the basketball players are black. And two years ago, 51 percent of women's Division I players were black. (Most of the coaching and administrative positions in college basketball are still held by whites.)

"The greatest number of career prospects are in college sport rather than professional sport because of the number of jobs available," Lapchick said in issuing his latest college report. "That makes it even more important for us to create expanded opportunities in college sport for women and people of color."

>

FILE - In this Nov. 28, 2005, file photo, David Lattin, left, and Willie Worsley chat before watching a screening of the movie "Glory Road," based on the 1966 NCAA-champion Texas Western college basketball team, in El Paso, Texas. Lattin has watched Oklahoma make a bid for an NCAA Tournament berth with a mixture of pride and wonder: The Sooners feature his grandson, Khadeem, and the two have forged a close relationship over the years, with the younger Lattin well aware of grandpa's role on the 1966 Texas Western team that won it all and shattered racial barriers along the way. (AP Photo/El Paso Times, Ruben Ramirez)

A Texas Western effect, if you will.

It happened for players 50 years ago, or at least started to happen.

Hall of Famer Bob McAdoo left his home state of North Carolina in the late 1960s to spend his first two years of college at a small school in Indiana. He said he did so in part because of the pressures that came with being a young black man playing in the South at that time.

Then his father fell ill, and McAdoo wanted to be closer to home. Then-North Carolina

FILE - In this April 2, 2007, file photo, Harry Flournoy, left, and David Lattin, members of the 1966 NCAA-champion Texas Western basketball team, hold their jerseys after being named members of the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame Class of 2007 in Atlanta. Fifty years ago, Texas Western started five black–Willie Worsley, Orsten Artis, Bobby Joe Hill, Lattin and Flournoy–against Kentucky in the NCAA championship game on March 19, 1966 at Cole Field House in College Park, Md. (AP Photo/Gerry Broome, File)

coach Dean Smith told him that coming to what was then a nearly all-white campus might not be easy.

"But I'll treat you like a son," McAdoo recalled the UNC coach saying. "So that told me I would be all right, and I went to North Carolina. Things were changing."

Texas Tech coach Tubby Smith — who was Kentucky's coach from 1997 through 2007, winning a national title there — remembers watching the Kentucky-Texas Western game on television. In black and white, of course. And he was rooting for the Miners.

FILE - In this March 20, 1966 file photo, Texas Western coach Don Haskins, center, is congratulated after Texas Western defeated Kentucky 72-65 to win the NCAA men's college basketball championship in College Park, Md. Fifty years ago, Texas Western started five blacks–Willie Worsley, Orsten Artis, Bobby Joe Hill, David "Big Daddy" Lattin and Harry Flournoy–against Kentucky. Today, after reading historical recaps and watching movies, people tend to think it was an immediate watershed moment in sports and civil rights. It wasn't. (AP Photo/File)

"It was like pulling for Joe Louis, pulling for Jackie Robinson, pulling for a lot of African Americans playing sports," Tubby Smith said.

He grew up in Maryland the son of sharecroppers, and doesn't remember watching too many games before that one. But he remembers every detail of that day — for example, it rained.

"I was just going from my ninth grade to my 10th grade, and I was just going from a predominantly all-black school at George Washington Carver to Great Mills High School," Tubby Smith said. "So that was really a watershed moment, a special time for me watching it because that very next year I was going to be playing at Great Mills High School with white classmates and white teammates."

FILE - In this Feb. 4, 2016, file photo, Nevil Shed, a member of the 1966 Texas Western basketball NCAA men's college basketball championship team, speaks about the team’s title game at an exhibit about the team on the UTEP campus in El Paso, Texas. The historic photo behind him is of teammate Orsten Artis. (Rudy Gutierrez/The El Paso Times via AP, File)

Just like that, he realized it didn't have to be blacks vs. whites, even at that time in America.

Most games weren't on television then, and even though Texas Western was 23-0 and ranked No. 2 in the nation at one point, many people didn't see the Miners coming.

"We didn't even hardly know who Texas Western was," Riley said.

Riley doesn't remember any great motivational speech on game day from Adolph Rupp, the legendary Kentucky coach who, to Riley's chagrin, comes across as something of a racist in the movie.

And on the Texas Western side, black Miners star David Lattin said he didn't even realize that coach Don Haskins was going to play only the team's black players. Lattin said Haskins barely even made any mention of race that season, including the day of the title game.

"He said, 'You know what? It's up to you.' And he walked out of the room," Lattin said. "So he didn't tell us that he was just going to play the black guys. He didn't say that. I had no idea that's what he was talking about. We never even realized that until the game was over."

FILE - In this March 30, 1998, file photo, Kentucky coach Tubby Smith is carried off the court by game MVP Jeff Sheppard, left, Steve Masiello, center right, and Jamaal Maglioire second from right front, after Kentucky defeated Utah for the NCAA men's college basketball championship at the Alamodome in San Antonio. It's been 50 years since Texas Western won a title, struck a blow for civil rights and changed college basketball. Texas Tech coach Tubby Smith, who was the Kentucky coach from 1997 through 2007, remembers watching the Kentucky-Texas Western game on television. In black and white, of course. And he was rooting for the Miners. (AP Photo/Eric Draper, File)

Over the years, Riley has been invited to plenty of Texas Western reunions. He's been to a few, and got to shake those same hands again, as he did in the locker room that night.

Riley abhors losses. This one, he has practically embraced. Beaten, he said, by a most deserving team.

"When it comes down to how good were they, they could have been one of the best ever," Riley said. "The best ever."

FILE - In this July 11, 2012, file photo, Miami Heat President Pat Riley listens to a question during a news conference in Miami. Fifty years ago, Riley and his teammates on Kentucky’s all-white squad had just lost the national championship game to little Texas Western, which started five black players. As he left the floor that day, Riley realized he had not shaken hands with the winners. So the Kentucky star found the nerve to venture into the Texas Western locker room. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky, File)

FILE - This is a 1959 file photo showing University of Kentucky basketball coach Adolph Rupp. Breaking down racial barriers wasn't the only legacy left from the 1966 title game between Kentucky and Texas Western. The two coaches, Rupp and Don Haskins, were trailblazers who helped to revolutionize the way the game is played today. (AP Photo/HBL, File)

[pilgrim]

Remember this great game!

Loved Don Haskins!

[DoughtyOne]

[ealgeone]

Trivia: Kentucky had beaten Duke for the right to play in the championship game.

Duke had an all white team as well.

Rupp has been wrongly branded a racist. I wonder how Duke would be viewed had they won the game against Kentucky that night?

[pilgrim]

Like to see the underdog win.

Enjoyed this game.

[Rebelbase]

Glory Road—great movie. Highly recommend.

[A_Tradition_Continues]

Texas Western=University of Texas-El Paso (UTEP)...for those that have never heard of Texas Western.

[pilgrim]

Thanks.

I thought of that and failed to mention it when posting.

‘Those were the days m friend.’

[ealgeone]

Kentucky was actually the underdog that night. IIRC several of their players were sick with some form of stomach bug. They were not up to 100% full strength.

Would they have won if they were all healthy?

The world can only speculate.

[CommieCutter]

The same I bet.

[Road Warrior ‘04]

Remember pulling for Texas Western in the game, but don’t recall that all the TW players were black. They were all just basketball players to me.

[Alberta's Child]

I thought it was a good movie, but it got absolutely panned on talk radio here in the NYC area because of all the historical inaccuracies in it.

[gwjack]

David Lattin has at least one grandson; Khadeem Lattin. Khadeem is a starting center for the OU basketball team. He plays a lot like his grand dad.

Gwjack

[Gil4]

I’m pretty old (so my kids tell me) but not old enough to remember the game. (I was 1 at the time.) Don Haskins was a heck of a coach, though. The championship team was in part a product of the times - top athletes wouldn’t have gone to El Paso unless doors had been slammed in their faces elsewhere. But even 30 years after the national championship, Haskins was fielding competitive teams with much lesser talent.

I didn’t know much about him or UTEP until I was stationed at Holloman AFB in the 90s and listened to the sports talk radio out of El Paso fairly regularly. Haskins could have gone anywhere and coached and made a lot more money, but he stayed at TW/UTEP for more than 30 years. He really embraced the city and there’s probably not a more revered public figure in El Paso history than Don Haskins. (OK, my knowledge of El Paso history is limited. Are there any other revered public figures in El Paso history?)

[pilgrim]

Not acquainted with El Paso history but found this.

http://www.biography.com/people/groups/birth-city-el-paso

The only one remembered from El Paso was Sam Donaldson;
Debbie Reynolds, Gene Roddenberry and our Gov. Susana Martinez and a couple more.

Enjoyed watching Haskin’s teams and when UTEP came to play the Lobos it was always a must watch game.

[bygolly]

I was going to Coronado High School in El Paso in the 60's and the win by unknown TWC (UTEP) was an awesome time in El Paso. My mom worked at the TWC Extension Center and my dad collected tickets at the BB games. Had the opportunity to see some of stars of those years, Bobby Joe Hill, Big Daddy Lattin, and others, and their coach Don Haskins.

It was mighty exciting for this young high school student.

[pilgrim]

I can only imagine. Glad you have that to remember!