Immortality and Honor: Contributions From College Hoops to Memorial Day
There are occasions when we freely recall the full spectrum of players ranging from knuckleheads to knuckle-down heads of corporations. A Memorial Day weekend generates sobering reminders of what is really important to our freedom. College basketball contributions include the following individuals:
Baylor has developed a reputation the past couple of seasons for having some "soft" players who played with the fervor of a man holding his female companion's purse at the mall much of a shopping excursion afternoon. But Baylor is believed to be the only non-service academy in America to have two former athletes go on to win the Congressional Medal of Honor. Both men, Jack Lummus and John "Killer" Kane, earned the nation's highest military honor for heroics in World War II. Lummus played football, basketball and baseball for the Bears from 1938 through 1941. He was an All-Southwest Conference center fielder before signing with the NFL's New York Giants.
After one year of pro football, Lummus joined the U.S. Marines and was a platoon leader in the initial days of fighting on Iwo Jima. While leading a charge on enemy positions, Lummus stepped on a land mine and lost both legs. Despite heavy bleeding, he led his platoon to knock out several pockets of Japanese fire, a vital part of the U.S. victory. Alas, Lummus died of his wounds shortly after the battle.
Kane, who also played football and basketball, was one of the survivors on Baylor's ill-fated 1927 basketball squad that lost 10 of its 21-member traveling party in a bus-train wreck en route to Austin, Tex. As a result of the "Immortal Ten" tragedy, the remainder of the first of coach Ralph Wolf's 15 seasons was cancelled, and the first highway overpass in Texas was constructed.
Kane joined the Army Air Corps in 1932 and soon became a bomber commander of legendary proportions. It was said he was the best pilot and toughest commander in the Air Corps. It was often debated who feared him more - the Germans or his own men.
On August 1, 1943, Kane led what at the time was the deadliest air battle in history - a low-level, long-range bombing raid on Hitler's oil-refining complex in Rumania. The site produced a major portion of the Axis' fuel and was one of the most heavily-guarded locations in history.
The heroism exhibited by ex-hoopsters doesn't stop there. Al Brown, Creighton's leading scorer in 1925-26, survived the infamous Bataan Death March in the Philippines. Ex-players warranting salutes for making the supreme sacrifice include:
All 11 regulars on Pittsburgh's 1941 Final Four team participated in World War II and one of them, guard Bob Artman, was killed in action.
Kentucky players who competed multiple years for the Wildcats before they were killed during WWII included Mel Brewer (Army second lieutenant/died in France), Ken England (Army captain of ski troop/Italy), James Goforth (Marine first lieutenant/Marshall Islands) and Jim King (Army second lieutenant and co-pilot/Germany). Brewer, England and King were three of the top seven scorers for UK's first NCAA Tournament and Final Four team in 1942.
Bob "Ace" Calkins, UCLA's top scorer in the late 1930s before Jackie Robinson arrived, was navigator on an airplane ("The Flying Fortress") gunned down during WWII. He later died in an Italian prison camp from wounds suffered in the crash.
Edward Christl, a center and Army team captain for the Cadets' unbeaten squad in 1944, was a first lieutenant during WWII the next year when he was killed in action. Army's arena is named after him.
Colorado A&M's Lewis "Dude" Dent, voted the best all-around athlete in the Mountain States Conference in 1943, was an Army lieutenant among forward observers giving firing coordinates on the radio when killed in action in France in August 1944.
Montana State's Cyrus Gatton, a pilot with the 11th Areo Squadron, was killed in action in Europe the first week in November 1918, a week before the Armistice was signed ending World War I.
Eddie Grant, who played basketball for Harvard at the turn of the 20th Century before becoming an infielder for 10 years in the majors, died from shelling on October 5, 1918, in the Argonne Forest, France, during WWI while in charge of his battalion after his commanding officer was killed.
Thomas P. Hunter, a three-year letterman who was a sophomore member of Kansas' 1940 runner-up, was killed in action against the Japanese on Guam, July 21, 1944, while fighting with the Ninth Marines as a first lieutenant. Hunter was elected posthumously as captain of the Jayhawks' 1945-46 squad that compiled a 19-2 record.
Nile Kinnick, Iowa's Heisman Trophy winner as a quarterback-halfback in 1939, played basketball for the Hawkeyes during his sophomore year, averaging 6.1 ppg to finish as their second-leading scorer. After bypassing pro football to attend law school, he was killed in a plane crash in 1943 while serving in the Navy.
Center Bill Menke, the third-leading scorer for Indiana's 1940 NCAA champion who supplied a team-high 10 points in the Hoosiers' national semifinal victory over Duquesne, later became a Navy pilot and served in World War II. In January 1945, he was declared missing in action (and presumed dead) when he didn't return from a flight in the Caribbean.
Harry "Porky" O'Neill paced Gettysburg (Pa.) to two Eastern Pennsylvania Conference championships in the late 1930s and caught one game for the Philadelphia Athletics in 1939. After surviving the worst of the horrific fighting at Iwo Jima, the Marine first lieutenant was killed instantly on March 6, 1945, by a sniper's bullet piercing his throat and severing his spinal cord as he prepared to bed down on a starlit night.
Four-sport letterman Tommy Peters, who averaged 17.5 ppg to lead the Southern Conference in scoring in 1942-43, died during WWII after only one season with Davidson.
San Diego State's Milton "Milky" Phelps, the NAIA Tournament's first bona fide standout when he sparked the Aztecs to the 1941 title after two runner-up finishes, gave his life for his country during WWII in the crash of a Navy torpedo bomber.
Curtis Popham, Texas' co-captain in 1943, was killed during WWII.
Robert Roach, a member of Omaha's squad before entering the military, was a second lieutenant in the Army Air Forces in July 1945 when he died in the crash of his plane in Arizona, where he was an instructor.
Carleton (MN) forward Wayne Sparks, a "Little All-American" in 1936-37, died in a bomber crash during WWII.
Four-time All-MCAU forward Eugene "Peaches" Westover, class of '38 for Drury (MO), was killed January 1, 1945, at the Battle of the Bulge.
Numerous standout players had their college playing careers sidetracked by WWII. Following is a list of All-Americans who had their college days interrupted in the mid-1940s while serving in the U.S. Armed Forces:
Air Force - Charles Black (Kansas) and Jack Parkinson (Kentucky).
Army - Don Barksdale (UCLA), Lew Beck (Oregon State), A.L. Bennett (Oklahoma A&M), Gale Bishop (Washington State), Vince Boryla (Notre Dame/Denver), Harry Boykoff (St. John's), Bob Brannum (Kentucky), Arnie Ferrin (Utah), Alex Groza (Kentucky), Ralph Hamilton (Indiana), Walt Kirk (Illinois), Allie Paine (Oklahoma), Don Rehfeldt (Wisconsin), Jack Smiley (Illinois), Odie Spears (Western Kentucky) and Gerry Tucker (Oklahoma).
Marine Corps - Aud Brindley (Dartmouth), John Hargis (Texas), Mickey Marty (Loras), Andy Phillip (Illinois), Gene Rock (southern California) and Kenny Sailors (Wyoming).
Navy - Bobby Cook (Wisconsin), Howie Dallmar (Stanford/Penn), Dick Dickey (North Carolina State), Bob Faught (Notre Dame), Harold Gensichen (Western Michigan), Wyndol Gray (Bowling Green State), Hal Haskins (Hamline), Leo Klier (Notre Dame), Dick McGuire (St. John's) and John Oldham (Western Kentucky).
In an incredible achievement, Phillip and Tucker returned to first-team All-American status in 1946-47 after missing three seasons while serving in the military. Black and Sailors also returned to All-American acclaim after missing two seasons. Meanwhile, Whitey Skoog served in the U.S. Navy before becoming a three-time All-American with Minnesota in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Gus Broberg, an aviator with the Marines after being named an NCAA consensus first-team All-American for Dartmouth in 1940 and 1941, lost his right arm in a plane crash. He went on to study law and become a respected judge in Florida.
Fallen heroes also emerged post-WWII. Don Holleder, who averaged 9.3 ppg as a junior and 6.8 ppg as a senior for Army in the mid-1950s, was a major during the Vietnam War in October, 1967, when he was killed by a sniper's bullet in an ambush 40 miles from Saigon as he hurled himself into enemy fire attempting to rescue wounded comrades.
We honor and remember after they went from the playing field to battlefield!