1966 Title game question

[TopCatCal]

Funny thing about the language that coach Rupp supposedly used at halftime of this game. The people that we know for a FACT, was in the UK locker room at halftime, Joe B Hall, Pat Riley, Louie Dampier, Larry Conley, ect... To a man will tell you, that not one racist word was uttered by coach Rupp... But does that mean anything to the lying, elitists' in the media? Of course not. Apparently it must make their dirty, liberal asses feel superior to others when they get to tag somebody as a racist. Especially if it's a white southerner, or a born again Christian, or a republican..... I dislike liberals more everyday I live.

 

[Estil]

In the other locker room, I wouldn't be surprised if the TexWes coach tried as an inspirational/motivational tactic to claim Rupp was this big bad racist...but then when someone on his staff pointed out that Rupp in fact was anything but a racist, the coach would've been all like, "Well I know that and you know that...but they don't"

Of course unless any of those in the locker room can confirm one way or the other we'll never know for sure what was said in there. And there is that whole code of the clubhouse thing you know...

 

[mktmaker]

Here's another thought that I recall...or MISrember...

Around 1989 once ESPN went more national ...and therefore needed more content...they produced shows like Dick Schapp interviews and The Sports Reporters around Sunday morning's Sport Center.

As I recall Frank DeFord (see above) who was an arrogant but skilled sportswriter, tried (with others to capitalize on the success of USA Today -- and it's sports section success). In 1989, Deford became editor-in-chief of The National, the first daily U.S. sports newspaper. It ceased publication after only 18 months.

Anyway, as I remember Deford claimed (on ESPN air) that from OUTSIDE the 1966 halftime Kentucky locker room that an angry Rupp shouted that "we should be beating these coons!"

However, both Pat Riley and Larry Conley denounced that they never heard Coach Rupp say such things.

Also, as mentioned above, DeFord covered the 1966 championship game. In it he never mentioned anything about Rupp's racism.

This was well before the internet was widespread.

When I moved to Atlanta in 1989, I visited the Fulton County Public Library in downtown Atlanta. I looked at the bound copies of the spring 1966 copies of Sport lllustrated. To my disappointment, DeFord's article had been removed.

Anyway, that's what I recall.

 

[Estil]

And until the advent of the Internet, people didn't have much reason to question whether or not the standard news sources were doing reporting/coverage the right way. And who other than UK fans would've bothered even questioning claims that Rupp was a racist?

I was born in 1980, among the last generations who remembers clearly what the pre-Internet world was like...and the Internet from my HS/college days (late 90s/early 00s) was not unlike the days of B&W/Indian head test pattern TV compared to how the Internet is today.

 

[Estil]

When I moved to Atlanta in 1989, I visited the Fulton County Public Library in downtown Atlanta. I looked at the bound copies of the spring 1966 copies of Sport lllustrated. To my disappointment, DeFord's article had been removed.

Here you go (they archived them all, even the hee hee swimsuit editions ):

https://www.si.com/vault/issue/42878/1/3

SPOILER ALERT: Here too, not one peep, not one mention of the words "black", "negro", "colored", or "African". It was covered just as they would've any other NCAA title game. They didn't say there was a white team and a black team...there were simply two teams.

 

[JPScott]

Here you go (they archived them all, even the hee hee swimsuit editions ):

https://www.si.com/vault/issue/42878/1/3

SPOILER ALERT: Here too, not one peep, not one mention of the words "black", "negro", "colored", or "African". It was covered just as they would've any other NCAA title game. They didn't say there was a white team and a black team...there were simply two teams.

Deford didn't mention is specifically in the article on the game but the previous week he did make mention of it when he wrote:

• 
  "All seven of the Texas Western regulars are Negroes, hardly a startling fact nowadays but one that becomes noteworthy because of the likely meeting with Kentucky or Duke. Both those teams are all-white. It is unfortunate -- but it is a fact -- that some Ethniks, both white and Negro, already are referring to the prospective national final as not just a game but a contest for racial honors. More than anything else, however, all four finalists demonstrate that their players are brothers under their recruited skins."- by Frank Deford, Sports Illustrated, "Now There are Four," March 21, 1966.

Link to Deford's Article: "Now There are Four" (March 21, 1966)

As I mentioned earlier, the previous year Deford wrote an article specifically talking about Butch Beard and mentioning/praising the fact that Kentucky was recruiting him.

Link to Deford's SI Article on Butch Beard: "The Negro Athlete is Invited Home" (June 14, 1965)

 

[CatGotMyTongue]

Here you go (they archived them all, even the hee hee swimsuit editions ):

https://www.si.com/vault/issue/42878/1/3

SPOILER ALERT: Here too, not one peep, not one mention of the words "black", "negro", "colored", or "African". It was covered just as they would've any other NCAA title game. They didn't say there was a white team and a black team...there were simply two teams.

That's cuz Rupp thought they were Mexican..being from El Paso and all

 

[Estil]

I guess I stand corrected JPScott.

 

[The Simple Truth]

Actually I don't think Deford ever really wrote about it. He was the SI beat writer during the 1966 Final Four and made only a passing reference to it at the time.

Decades later it came out what Deford claims that Rupp told his team during halftime, but that was all second hand. I.e. One of his colleagues mentioned Deford as hearing it, but Deford himself didn't write about it at the time of those revelations in the late 80's/early 90's either.

Curry Kirkpatrick

 

[The Simple Truth]

Deford didn't mention is specifically in the article on the game but the previous week he did make mention of it when he wrote:

• 
  "All seven of the Texas Western regulars are Negroes, hardly a startling fact nowadays but one that becomes noteworthy because of the likely meeting with Kentucky or Duke. Both those teams are all-white. It is unfortunate -- but it is a fact -- that some Ethniks, both white and Negro, already are referring to the prospective national final as not just a game but a contest for racial honors. More than anything else, however, all four finalists demonstrate that their players are brothers under their recruited skins."- by Frank Deford, Sports Illustrated, "Now There are Four," March 21, 1966.

Link to Deford's Article: "Now There are Four" (March 21, 1966)

As I mentioned earlier, the previous year Deford wrote an article specifically talking about Butch Beard and mentioning/praising the fact that Kentucky was recruiting him.

Link to Deford's SI Article on Butch Beard: "The Negro Athlete is Invited Home" (June 14, 1965)

I was his Student Manager Rupp was no racist end of story

 

[JPScott]

Curry Kirkpatrick

Kirkpatrick wrote an anti-Rupp piece in Sporst Illustrated for the 25th anniversary of the 1966 game ("The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", April 1, 1991) where he mentioned Rupp saying the derogative during halftime, but didn't attribute it to anyone at the time.

What I was referring to was an excerpt from the book The Franchise by Michael MacCambridge about Sports Illustrated which was published many years later in 1997. As far as I know that was the first time the comment was attributed as coming from Frank Deford, and as mentioned Deford himself didn't write about it.

It was said that Deford didn't feel comfortable writing about it directly because he supposedly had made a deal with Rupp that he could use quotes only if UK won the game. As I argue on my Rupp page, I don't really buy this. If Deford was so offended by the remark, he had plenty of time after the game to follow up on the issue while Rupp was still alive. Yet Deford never did, even though Sports Illustrated did give a platform to others during that time to discuss race in sports. (In particular they excerpted Jack Olsen's book on "The Black Athlete", one part which specifically discussed Texas Western.)

 

[wcc31]

Curry Kirkpatrick is the epitome of North Carolina- sanctimonious phony hypocrite.