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University Daily Kansan Tuesday, March 17, 1964
'Superstitious' Winter Gambles with Fortune
By Jack Brannan United Press International
MANHATTAN — (UPI) — Tex Winter, the sometimes superstitious basketball coach at Kansas State, gambled with his luck today.
He sent his brown suit to the cleaners.
But he wasn't worried. It was due back in time for him to wear again by Friday night. That is when Kansas State meets top-ranked and undefeated UCLA in the national semi-finals of the NCAA basketball tournament in Kansas City.
Winter has worn the suit, a brown wool with muted black plaid, for each of his team's last 13 games. And Kansas State has won them all en route to the Big Eight Conference and then the NCAA Midwest Regional championships.
"But if I hadn't sent the suit to the cleaners today," said Winter, "the suit itself would have been our biggest offensive threat in Kansas City."
Winter has worn the suit on game nights since last Jan. 27, when Kansas State started its winning streak with a 97-91 victory over Oklahoma.
The 13th victory in the streak, which also was Winter's 200th in 11 years at Kansas State, came last Saturday night when his team walloped sixth-ranked Wichita 94-86 for the Midwest Regional crown.
In the steamy dressing room after the game, Winter said he would not consider sending the suit to the cleaner until after next weekend. But he changed his mind today after returning home and examining the fabric.
"I don't sit alone on the bench, you know," he explained. "And any-way, it's not the suit that has been winning games for us."
"If there is any luck in that suit, the cleaners certainly won't be able to take it out.
"So I'll be wearing it again in Kansas City. You can bet on that."
Wichita and ninth-ranked Texas Western, Kansas State's first victim in the Midwest Regional, would be tough to convince that the suit had anything to do with Kansas State's success. The credit went, instead, to
KUTrack Team Schedules 12 Outdoor Meets
KU will run a 12-meet Outdoor track and field schedule this spring, opening at the Texas Relays, April 3-4.
Coach Bill Easton's squad will run the schedule with a corps of six Big Eight champions and 11 lettermen. The former roster includes three newly-crowned kings: pole vaulter Floyd Manning; two-miler John Lawson, and high jumper Tyce Smith won indoor titles two weeks ago in Kansas City. Manning also won the 1963 outdoor title at Manhattan last May as did Glen Martin in the broad jump and Paul Acevedo in the three-mile.
heriad Hadley won the 1963 indoor two-mile and came back this year to score a fifth in the mile and second in the 1,000.
Acevedo is the lone NCAA placewinner among this team, having finished sixth in the three-mile at Albuquerque last June.
PAT CULPEPER, LINEBACKER and co-captain of the undefeated 1962 University of Texas football team, is now freshman coach at his alma mater.
Murrell, a 6-foot-6 forward and the Big Eight Player of the Year, led Kansas State's offense with 52 points and 21 rebounds in the two games. He was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player.
a tenacious 1-3-1 zone defense and Willie Murrell.
The Most Valuable Player honor was quite an accomplishment, considering that All-American Dave Stallworth of Wichita beat Murrell in all statistics with 59 points and 39 rebounds. But even Stallworth's 37 points in the final game against Kansas State couldn't bring the Missouri Valley Conference co-champion the regional title.
And the Kansas State zone defense, which gave opponents the corner and outside shots but nothing near the basket, smothered the attack tactics of both Wichita and Texas Western.
Jim Barnes, Texas Western's powerful 6-foot-7 center, went out against Kansas State in the first game with a 30.6-point scoring average and a 22-per-game rebounding mark. The zone choked him off with four points and nine rebounds in a game that Kansas State won 64-60.
The zone didn't stop Stallworth, who is deadly from all sections of the court. But it stopped his teammates, and that was all Kansas State needed to take its second regional championship under Winter.
Winter said his team played its "very best" against Wichita because the players knew they must in order to win.
But the Kansas State players knew, too, that Winter was wearing his lucky brown suit.
Shocker Coach Voices Interest InCoaching KU
WICHITA—(UPI)—Coach Ralph Miller brought the University of Wichita to the peak of its basketball success in his 13th season this year.
But he still has an unfulfilled ambition to coach someday at his alma mater, the University of Kansas.
And adding fuel to Miller's ambition is a current report that Coach Dick Harp may soon resign.
"There are not many schools I would consider moving to from Wichita. But Kansas is the big one among those I would consider."
"There will always be a soft spot in my heart for Kansas," said Miller, who was captain of the Kansas basketball team in 1942.
Miller emphasized, however, that he is not seeking another job.
When he became coach at Wichita in 1951, the Missouri Valley Conference team was a consistent loser. But after his first season, Wichita became a winner and has remained a winner since then.
The past season was the finest for both Miller and Wichita. His team won a share of the conference championship for the first time, made its first appearance in the NCAA tournament, finished with a 23-6 record, and ranked sixth in the final national ratings.
"If I wanted to change, this would be the time to do it," said Miller, who has a 220-133 record at Wichita.
"But I don't see that there is anything I can say as long as they have a coach at Kansas."
KU won 42 games and lost only eight in Harp's first two seasons. But when Chamberlain left one year early to join the pros, KU basketball fortunes began to dwindle. In the six seasons since Chamberlain departed, Harp has had a 79-74 record.
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(Formerly Gustafson)
809 Mass. VI 3-5432
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