A Defining Moment: Texas Western's Historic 1966 NCAA Championship
The 1966 NCAA University Division basketball tournament culminated in a championship game that transcended sports, leaving an indelible mark on the landscape of college basketball and American society. The 28th annual edition of the tournament, which began on March 7 and concluded on March 19 at Cole Field House on the University of Maryland campus in College Park, saw third-ranked Texas Western (now UTEP), under the guidance of coach Don Haskins, secure a 72-65 victory over top-ranked Kentucky, coached by Adolph Rupp. This game was more than just a championship; it was a watershed moment.
The Tournament and the Teams
The 1966 NCAA University Division basketball tournament involved 22 schools competing in a single-elimination format to determine the national men's basketball champion of the NCAA University Division, now known as Division I. In 1965-66, the paths of the Miners and the Wildcats that would cross so dramatically at the end had modest beginnings. Kentucky was 15-10 the season before, Texas Western 16-9, and neither was ranked when they began play. By that night in College Park, the Wildcats were ranked No. 1, the Miners No. 3. Both teams were 23-0 and suffered their only losses of the regular season on the same day - March 5, 1966. Texas Western was beaten 74-72 at Seattle, Kentucky 69-62 at Tennessee. Neither Seattle nor Tennessee were invited to the NCAA tournament. Nor, for that matter, was UCLA - the only time in John Wooden’s last 14 seasons that the Bruins were left out. Lew Alcindor was playing on the freshman team that season. Texas Western came very close to never having the chance to make history. Twice. The Miners had to come from 10 points back to edge Cincinnati 78-76 in overtime in its second tournament game, then barely escaped Kansas 81-80 in two overtimes in their next game.
Haskins' Decision and its Impact
Don Haskins made history by starting five African-American players for the first time in an NCAA Championship game. "I really didn't think about starting five black guys. I just wanted to put my five best guys on the court," Haskins said. "I was simply playing the best players I had." "I wasn’t out to be a pioneer when we played Kentucky,” Texas Western coach Don Haskins told the Los Angeles Times years later. “I was simply playing the best players on the team, and they happened to be Black.” This decision, while seemingly straightforward, challenged the status quo of college basketball, particularly in the South, where racial segregation was still prevalent.
Texas Western College, now UTEP, defeated the University of Kentucky. That win accelerated the advancement of black athletes in the South. Although the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision outlawed segregation in schools, its impact on sports, especially in the South, was gradual. Haskins’s move to start five black players was a bold statement that merit and talent should transcend racial barriers.
The Game Itself
The Miners took the lead midway through the first half and never relinquished it, although the Wildcats closed to within a point early in the second half. The final score was 72-65 in favor of Texas Western. A factor in that game was the Miners shooting 21 more free throws. The beaten Wildcats considered it a crushing loss at the time, not a mile marker on the long road of social progress. “It really didn’t become what it became until years later,” Pat Riley, a Kentucky player that season, once said. No one understood the moment better, or quicker, than the players themselves, remembering the hard journeys they had taken to get there. As for the rest of the sport, well, it took a while. A good bit of time has passed to fog recollections.
Read also: UCLA Basketball: 1966 Season
The Opposing Coach and Program
Adolph Rupp, Kentucky’s coach from 1930-1972, recruited almost exclusively inside Kentucky, earning the nickname “The Baron of Bluegrass.” Like many other coaches of the era, Rupp did not recruit African American players. Later in his career, he signed 7-foot-2 Black center Tom Payne. The Wildcats were led by head coach Adolph Rupp. "It was a thrill for me-I'm kind of a young punk-and to play a game with Mr. Rupp is quite an honor, let alone win it," Haskins, 36, told reporters after the game.
The Broader Context
More than a half century later, the significance of one national championship game in Maryland’s Cole Field House is beyond debate. When UTEP and its all-African-American lineup brought down all-conquering - and all-white - Kentucky in 1966, college basketball would never be the same. So many closed doors of the past soon opened, and a trickle of black players to many of the top programs eventually turned into a gusher.
In the remote desert city of El Paso, where a melting pot of cultures on the U.S-Mexico border had existed for years, race was not an issue for the Texas Western basketball team. Led by Don Haskins, a gruff, straight-talking coach known as "The Bear," the Miners lit up the 1965-66 regular season with a 23-1 record. In the tournament's first round, Texas Western defeated Oklahoma City, 89-74. The team beat Cincinnati in the second round, 78-76, in overtime.
The tournament is also significant in that it was the last tournament until 2021, and one of two since the league's official founding, that the Ivy League did not send a representative to the tournament. The league champion, Penn, refused to comply with an NCAA edict that all teams must certify a 1.6 GPA for all student-athletes; the Ivy League and the university did not believe that the NCAA had the power to dictate such things, and as such the team was banned.
Lasting Legacy
Haskins went on to produce many more winning teams and many NBA stars before retiring from UTEP in 1999. More than 40 years later, we remember - and cherish - the game that changed basketball forever. That win accelerated the advancement of black athletes in the South.
Read also: Anthony Robles: Overcoming Obstacles
The 2006 film Glory Road is based on the story of the 1966 Texas Western team. Texas Western's journey to the 1966 NCAA championship was depicted in the 2006 film Glory Road. The movie Glory Road suggested Haskins tinkered with his lineup to start five black players in the championship game. Uh, no.
Key Facts and Anecdotes
- It was Texas Western College back then.
- Kentucky and Texas Western had never played before. They have never played since.
- Only five years before he helped create one of the most significant games in NCAA tournament history, Haskins was a high school coach in Texas.
- This was the first of two Final Fours to be held in Cole Field House. The second was 1970, when upstart Jacksonville stayed in the same hotel used by Texas Western.
- For all the historical significance of the victory, Texas Western didn’t even have the Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four. For that matter, neither did Kentucky. It went to a player from Utah, who lost twice, 85-78 to Texas Western and then 79-77 to Duke in the third-place game.
- The Associated Press account that night of the championship game didn’t mention one word about the racial breakdown of the lineups, or what it might mean. Not one word. Try to find a story about that game in the past 40 years that doesn’t mention it.
Read also: Crafting Your NCAA Profile
tags: #1966 #ncaa #championship #basketball #details
