Jayhawks wearing first undisputed Big 8 crown
By Ron Hanson
KU's conference winning victory Monday night over Colorado marked the first time in Jayhawk history that the team has won the Big Eight title outright, since the conference changed its name.
In 1960, Dick Harp coached the Jayhawks to a victory over Kansas State in a playoff game to win their first Conference championship since 1957, when the league was known as the Big Seven. The league did not become the Big Eight until 1958, when Oklahoma State became a member.
THROUGH the 69 years that KU has been a member of an officially recognized athletic organization, the basketball team has wen or tied for their league's championships 32 times, or almost half of the years they played.
From 1907 through 1930 when the Jayhawks played in the Missouri Valley Athletic Association,
High scorer on frosh five quits school
Don Ross, Waterloo, Ia., freshman and leading scorer and rebounder on the unbeaten 1965-66 Kansas freshman basketball team dropped out of school last weekend.
Ross withdrew from school after experiencing academic difficulties and apparently will not return.
ROSS PLAYED both forward and center for the KU frosh coached by Bob Mulcahy.
Mulcahay said, "I talked with Don about how difficult it would be for him to become eligible to play next winter."
Contacted at his home in Waterloo last night Ross said he hasn't decided where he will attend school next. "I'm working now and plan to go to summer school," he said.
HE GAVE no specific reason for leaving KU but said, "I didn't think I wanted to play ball down there."
Ross said State College of Iowa at nearby Cedar Falls, Ia., has been the only school to contact him since he departed from Kansas.
Ross is a 6-8 former high school all-America who averaged 19 points and 12 rebounds a game for KU's freshman squad this past season.
the basketball team, under coach Forrest C. (Phog) Allen, won 13 league titles and twice was the Helms Foundation National Champion.
In the years from 1931 to 1947 when KU was in the Big Six Conference, which included all the present Big Eight schools except Colorado and OSU, the Hawks won this league's crown 13 times and played in their first NCAA final losing to Indiana, 60-42, in 1940.
DURING the period of the Big Seven Conference, KU reached its greatest basketball glory as it was the conference champion five times between 1947 and 1958 and went to the NCAA tournament on three occasions. In 1952 when the Jayhawks won their first and only NCAA championship by smashing St. Johns, 80-63, the team went on to win a gold medal in the Olympics of that same year.
Since 1952 KU has only made it to the NCAA finals once. In 1953 with the great Wilt Chamberlain, KU lost to North Carolina, 55-53. in three overtimes in a game generally considered to have been the most evenly matched content in NCAA championship history. The game was close all the way, and KU had a chance to win it in the third overtime until Chamberlain missed a dunk shot.
When OSU was added to the league in 1958, and it became known as the Big Eight, KU basketball fortunes dwindled a bit. Before this year the Jayhawks had only an overall 61-49 record in Big Eight play and only one championship in eight years.
With a total won-lost record
that includes all games played in the school's history, KU is third in the nation.
This could be the year to end KU's drought in NCAA basketball tournaments. The team has already proven themselves to be champions by winning the Big Eight Conference title and will now battle with the Midwest's best in the regional tournament this weekend at Lubbock, Texas.
McCormack to coach line for Redskins
Mike McCormack, former offensive tackle with the Cleveland Browns who played his college ball at KU, has been named offensive line coach for the Washington Redskins, head Redskin coach Otto Graham announced Monday.
McCormack, 35, was with Cleveland for 10 years after playing at KU in the late 1940's where he gained distinction as the Big Seven's lineman of the year in 1950. He made the Pro Bowl five years as an offensive tackle with the Brownys.
When McCormack was at KU he was considered the finest "close in" blocker in the country and was named all-America in 1948 by the dean of American sports-writers, Grantland Rice.
He was a teammate of Graham's with the Brown's during the 1952-53-54 season. He has also helped Graham coach the College All Stars.
Gardner's play tops league
That late-season rampage by Colorado's Chuck Gardner not only let him sneak up and pass the field to win the Big Eight Conference's scoring title, but it also let him plant the claim of having the best over-all performance since records in the four individual categories have been kept for Conference games.
The Colorado senior red-head not only edged Kansas' Walter Wesley and Missouri's Ron Coleman for the scoring top, but he also finished second in rebounding, second in field goal accuracy, and fourth in free throwing percentage. This one-two-three-four finish is the best on record.
GARDNER'S stampeed showed 28 of 40 tries from the field, boosting his shooting accuracy mark to almost 54 per cent, second in the
conference. He also added 25 of 29 charity tosses, pushing his average to almost 76 per cent, fourth in the league. His rebounding pace held at 10.1, which let him finish second.
His 42-39 back-to-back spree was the league's top for the year. His 42 against Kansas marked a single game high and the 39 tied Wesley for the second best honors. Gardner ended with 284, a 20.3 average. Wesley had 283, a 20.9 standard. Coleman, who will be back next year, had 281, a 20.1 clip.
Daily Kansan 7
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