Cotton combines lucky charm with recruiting for success
MANHATTAN (UPI) — Lowell (Cotton) Fitzsimmons admits he's "a little superstitious." He also thinks this quiet little town on the Kansas prairie is one of the big recruiting bonuses he has in his favor.
The Kansas State basketball coach is 5-6 and has blond hair, the reason for his nickname. He combines his diminutive size with a crackling personality.
Fitzsimmons became head basketball coach at Kansas State after the Wildcats won the Big Eight championship in 1968 and Tex Winter decided to take the head job at the University of Washington after 15 years at the helm.
"Tex told me about it one day while we were driving to Hutchinson," recalls Cotton, who was Winter's assistant. "I about drove the car in a ditch around Salina somewhere."
Fitzsimmons, in his second year as head coach and the rookie among Big Eight mentors, has driven the Wildcats to a comfortable 8-2 league record and is on the verge of winning Kansas State's 14th conference championship.
He's done it with a club that was picked for a second-division finish in pre-season forecasts. But Cotton has helped his team with his wearing apparel, like Tex often did before him.
Fitzsimmons is doing it with a pair of purple checked trousers.
"I got 'em when we went to the Fort Worth Classic in December," says Cotton. "A faculty representative at TCU had a pair of 'em. I asked him where he got 'em. He had a tailor and he had another bolt of the same material. Ernie Barrett (athletic director) and I got a pair fitted. I got 'em right after the Big Eight tourney and I've been wearing 'em ever since."
"I figured if I couldn't win the league, I might as well look sharp losing." cracks Cotton.
But it hasn't worked out that way. Kansas State has won three road games in league play, two more than any other team. Of 38 Big Eight Conference games, only seven have been won by the visitor.
The trousers aren't the first superstition Fitzsimmons has developed. While he was at Moberly (Mo.) Junior College, where his teams won 224 games and two National Junior College championships in nine years, he wore the same tie tack, a replica of a door knocker. But he lost the tie tack his first year at Kansas State.
"I always wore it," he says. "I got nervous when I misplaced it and couldn't find it. But I lost it the first summer I came out here. I'm still looking for it."
Fitzsimmons has had two back-to-back good recruiting years, which is starting to pay off. He landed 6-7 Bob Zender from Edina, Minn., and 6-6 David Hall from Savannah, Ga., his first year. They've been valuable starters as sophomores this season.
Fitzsimmons believes any recruiting success he's had can be
K-State signs two
MANHATTAN (UPI)—Kansas State coach Vince Gibson signed two Dodge City schoolboy stars to Big Eight football letters of intent Tuesday night, running the Wildcats' total to 17.
Bill Holman, a 183-pound half-back, and Paul Steininger, 215-pound line backer -offensive tackle, poined the Kansas State ranks. Both were consensus first-team all-staters in high school and Holman was first-team All-America for Scholastic Coach Magazine.
Holman scored 53 touchdowns and gained more than 3,000 yards rushing in a three-year career.
traced to the placid pace of Manhattan.
"As any number of sports writers have told me," laughs Fitzsimmons, "it's kind of difficult to get into trouble in Manhattan after 8 o'clock at night. The only way might be to stumble and fall on a sidewalk."
8 KANSAN Feb. 19 1970
Cotton believes this is a big plus on his side, especially in the eyes of the parents of a prospect.
"The way times are today, with all the turmoil, I think Kansas State is sitting in a pretty good place," says Fitzsimmons. "Each school has its pluses and minuses. One of our biggest pluses is that we are, in a sense, a conservative institution.
"A boy will tell you he goes to school to get a degree first and play basketball second. But
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really, deep down, he comes to play basketball first and get a degree second. And what time he has for socializing sort of takes care of itself."
Fitzsimmons is a refreshing new face on the big-time basketball scene. In many ways, he's a lot like Winter. That is, he tells it like he sees it.
For instance, after K-State defeated Missouri at Columbia Monday night, 63-60, and pretty well locked up a berth in the NCAA Midwest Regional, Fitzsimmons took his team out to eat.
"Yeah, we really splurged," he says. "We shot the whole budget. We stopped at MacDonald's, picked up a few hamburgers and milk shakes, and headed off down the road. I told you we were a conservative school."
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