Quote:
Originally posted by JRutledge
I will put it to you this way. I will believe the people that were good enough to play for Kentucky and played for neighboring school like Louisville and what they thought of Coach Rupp. Was the Texas Western program in the Deep South? I guess Oscar Robinson never played southern school when he was a Cincinnati either or any other Black player at that time? There is a term that I have heard all my life as it related to race relations. Up South and Down South are terms used by many Black people at that time and still today. Just because Black people lived in the south did not mean they had that much of an easier road.
Peace
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What does Texas Western have to do with this discussion. The mere fact that you mention them just goes to show you have prejudged UK without actually knowing anything about them or their coach or WHO was actually behind the composition of the team. UK played them as they would any other team. The fact that it was the first time it was 5 whites vs. 5 blacks in a high profile game doesn't make the team/coach with 5 whites racists any more than it makes the team with 5 blacks racists.
Oscar Robinson wasn't even in college when those deep south schools were at their worst. I never said the Big O or other Blacks didn't play in the south. I said several SEC schools wouldn't schedule games against opponents with black players (where Rupp and UK would freely do). Since UK was in the SEC, 18 games per year would be against those teams. Not all school's programs had racists practices.
Oscar did actually play for Rupp on an all-star team at one point.
I also never said anything about blacks in the south having an easier or harder time. In fact, I'd guess that the blacks in the south had a miserable time. The way they were generally treated was dispicable.
Here are a few quotes from Rupp:
As the fifties came to a close, it became a legitimate question of when the University of Kentucky would integrate its basketball team. Rupp did start dropping small hints that he would like to recruit black players but his did not go far enough to satisfy those looking to him to take the first step.
"A national magazine article on Oscar Robertson sparked criticism of Rupp in Lexington when it mentioned that the coach had considered recruiting the black star.
" - by Frank Fitzpatrick, And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, Simon & Schuster, 1999, pg. 103)
Adolph Rupp was once asked if he would have liked to have had Wilt Chamberlain, the Philadelphia sensation who played for Kansas in the late 1950s. "Sure," Rupp said, "but could I take him to Atlanta and New Orleans or Starkville ?" - by Chip Alexander, Raleigh News and Observer, "Remembering Rupp," 1997.
Rupp announced in 1961 [5 years before the game against UTEP/Texas Wester] that he would sign and play black athletes. SEC schools which did not want to play UK would have to forfeit the games. When he learned that Mississippi State Coach Babe McCarthy secretly snuck his team out of the state in order to attend the NCAA Tournament, against state regulations, Rupp said, "That took some nerve on his part. Maybe that will wise those people up down there." - Adolph Rupp, Kentucky's Basketball Baron, - JNB
Sounds like the guy was not so racist afterall...maybe a little unwilling to stick his neck out but not racist.
[Edited by Camron Rust on Jan 6th, 2006 at 07:46 PM]