By Bill Koch
Kudos to David Ashbrock for the fine job he did assembling Sunday’s telecast of UC’s 1961 overtime victory against top-ranked Ohio State in the national championship game.
It was a treat to watch, and I’m sure it brought back a lot of memories for UC fans of a certain age. I was only eight years old in 1961, so my memory of that game is virtually nonexistent. But I have a clear memory of the 1963 title game vs. Loyola and to a lesser degree, the 1962 game.
The names Thacker, Yates, Bonham, Wilson, Hogue and Shingleton resonate strongly with me. I’ve been fortunate to have interviewed all of them except Hogue and Bonham, and I covered the Bearcats while Yates was the head coach.
I was also fortunate to have interviewed head coach Ed Jucker on several occasions over the years. He was a big Bob Huggins fan. And in a column I wrote in The Cincinnati Post on Feb. 8, 1999, he openly campaigned for UC do more remember to commerorate what the 1961, 1962 and 1963 teams accomplished during that remarkable three-year stretch.
Jucker passed away in 2002. He would have been pleased to see the 1961 national title game on TV Sunday night.
Here’s what I wrote about Jucker and Huggins back in 1999:
They’re separated by more than 35 years and a seemingly contrary approach to basketball. Ed Jucker inherited a fast-break team and slowed it down. Bob Huggins inherited a half-court team and sped it up.
They’re the most successful coaches in the history of UC basketball, Jucker with an 80.1 winning percentage and two national championships in five years during the early 1960s, Huggins with a 75.5 winning percentage since taking over for Tony Yates in 1989, and one Final Four appearance.
Jucker is 82 years old. He lives on Callawassie Island, S.C., 37 years removed from his second and final NCAA championship in 1962. He’s one of Huggins’ biggest fans. When he observes the current UC coach at work, he’s reminded of the way he used to coach.
“I think he’s a great coach,” Jucker said. “He’s the type of coach who demands excellence. He doesn’t turn his back when a mistake is made. I think we were together on that.”
Jucker lacked Huggins’ flair for colorful language, but he was no less intense in his own way. He was a stickler for constant repetition of fundamentals until they became second nature. He ran an offense that relied heavily on backdoor cuts to the basket. For it to work effectively, passes had to be perfectly timed. They couldn’t be thrown too high or too low or the offense would be thrown out of rhythm.
“Everything had to be right,” Jucker said.
The game has changed since Jucker’s day. His style of play would be considered quaint today, maybe even boring. The players are more athletic. The NCAA Tournament, then a 16-team affair, has been expanded to 64 teams. Television is everywhere, so the game must be more entertaining.
Jucker visited a UC practice shortly after Huggins was hired. He couldn’t believe the way Huggins talked to his players. “I had never seen anything like it,” Jucker said. “I said, ‘Wait a minute. What’s this?’”
But it’s not like Jucker was placid, a John Wooden type sitting quietly on the bench with a rolled-up program on his lap. He once jumped off the bench, ran to the scorer’s table, and pounded the horn on the clock to get an officials’ attention.
“You couldn’t get timeouts during those days,” Jucker said. “The only way I could get a timeout was to go up there and bang that buzzer. I figured they wouldn’t know who did it. They didn’t call a technical or anything.”
Like Huggins, Jucker insisted that his players toe the line. He didn’t yank them off the floor after a mistake the way Huggins sometimes does, but he made it clear they would play his way or they wouldn't play at all.
When Ron Bonham, who would become a consensus All-American, refused to subjugate himself to Jucker’s team concept during his sophomore year, Jucker benched him. "When you want to play the way I want you to play,” Jucker told Bonham,”whisper in my ear and I’ll let you play.
“The first six or nine games I didn’t play him,” Jucker said. “We went to Madison Square Garden. I think we were playing St. John’s. During the game, he whispered to me, ‘I’ll play your way, Coach.’ He went in and must have had 25 or 30 points.”
The memories pour out of Jucker in a steady steam, but so does a melancholy sense of being forgotten. He wonders it the folks at UC appreciate what his teams accomplished and lately he's been lobbying athletic director Bob Goin for more recognition of those teams in Shoemaker Center.” (The floor in Fifth Third Arena was named ‘Ed Jucker Court’ in 2002.)
Jucker hasn’t coached in Division I since he left UC in 1965, but every year around tournament time he gets that old feeling back and fires off a letter to Huggins wishing him good luck.
Maybe, he tells himself, this will be the year the Bearcats add their third national title banner to the wall in Shoemaker Center, when one era becomes forever intertwined with another, and one coach see his own reflection in the accomplishments of another.
“That would mean a great deal to me for the simple reason that more people would appreciate my teams,” Jucker said, “my almost forgotten teams. The students, they never even heard of us. A lot of the people there have forgotten about us already except the old-time boosters.”
The old coach watches UC on television when he gets the chance. What he sees is a team with the ingredients of a national champion. “They’re so strong and quick,” he said. “They can shoot. They can do everything.”
Just like Jucker’s teams.
Remember?
Kudos to David Ashbrock for the fine job he did assembling Sunday’s telecast of UC’s 1961 overtime victory against top-ranked Ohio State in the national championship game.
It was a treat to watch, and I’m sure it brought back a lot of memories for UC fans of a certain age. I was only eight years old in 1961, so my memory of that game is virtually nonexistent. But I have a clear memory of the 1963 title game vs. Loyola and to a lesser degree, the 1962 game.
The names Thacker, Yates, Bonham, Wilson, Hogue and Shingleton resonate strongly with me. I’ve been fortunate to have interviewed all of them except Hogue and Bonham, and I covered the Bearcats while Yates was the head coach.
I was also fortunate to have interviewed head coach Ed Jucker on several occasions over the years. He was a big Bob Huggins fan. And in a column I wrote in The Cincinnati Post on Feb. 8, 1999, he openly campaigned for UC do more remember to commerorate what the 1961, 1962 and 1963 teams accomplished during that remarkable three-year stretch.
Jucker passed away in 2002. He would have been pleased to see the 1961 national title game on TV Sunday night.
Here’s what I wrote about Jucker and Huggins back in 1999:
They’re separated by more than 35 years and a seemingly contrary approach to basketball. Ed Jucker inherited a fast-break team and slowed it down. Bob Huggins inherited a half-court team and sped it up.
They’re the most successful coaches in the history of UC basketball, Jucker with an 80.1 winning percentage and two national championships in five years during the early 1960s, Huggins with a 75.5 winning percentage since taking over for Tony Yates in 1989, and one Final Four appearance.
Jucker is 82 years old. He lives on Callawassie Island, S.C., 37 years removed from his second and final NCAA championship in 1962. He’s one of Huggins’ biggest fans. When he observes the current UC coach at work, he’s reminded of the way he used to coach.
“I think he’s a great coach,” Jucker said. “He’s the type of coach who demands excellence. He doesn’t turn his back when a mistake is made. I think we were together on that.”
Jucker lacked Huggins’ flair for colorful language, but he was no less intense in his own way. He was a stickler for constant repetition of fundamentals until they became second nature. He ran an offense that relied heavily on backdoor cuts to the basket. For it to work effectively, passes had to be perfectly timed. They couldn’t be thrown too high or too low or the offense would be thrown out of rhythm.
“Everything had to be right,” Jucker said.
The game has changed since Jucker’s day. His style of play would be considered quaint today, maybe even boring. The players are more athletic. The NCAA Tournament, then a 16-team affair, has been expanded to 64 teams. Television is everywhere, so the game must be more entertaining.
Jucker visited a UC practice shortly after Huggins was hired. He couldn’t believe the way Huggins talked to his players. “I had never seen anything like it,” Jucker said. “I said, ‘Wait a minute. What’s this?’”
But it’s not like Jucker was placid, a John Wooden type sitting quietly on the bench with a rolled-up program on his lap. He once jumped off the bench, ran to the scorer’s table, and pounded the horn on the clock to get an officials’ attention.
“You couldn’t get timeouts during those days,” Jucker said. “The only way I could get a timeout was to go up there and bang that buzzer. I figured they wouldn’t know who did it. They didn’t call a technical or anything.”
Like Huggins, Jucker insisted that his players toe the line. He didn’t yank them off the floor after a mistake the way Huggins sometimes does, but he made it clear they would play his way or they wouldn't play at all.
When Ron Bonham, who would become a consensus All-American, refused to subjugate himself to Jucker’s team concept during his sophomore year, Jucker benched him. "When you want to play the way I want you to play,” Jucker told Bonham,”whisper in my ear and I’ll let you play.
“The first six or nine games I didn’t play him,” Jucker said. “We went to Madison Square Garden. I think we were playing St. John’s. During the game, he whispered to me, ‘I’ll play your way, Coach.’ He went in and must have had 25 or 30 points.”
The memories pour out of Jucker in a steady steam, but so does a melancholy sense of being forgotten. He wonders it the folks at UC appreciate what his teams accomplished and lately he's been lobbying athletic director Bob Goin for more recognition of those teams in Shoemaker Center.” (The floor in Fifth Third Arena was named ‘Ed Jucker Court’ in 2002.)
Jucker hasn’t coached in Division I since he left UC in 1965, but every year around tournament time he gets that old feeling back and fires off a letter to Huggins wishing him good luck.
Maybe, he tells himself, this will be the year the Bearcats add their third national title banner to the wall in Shoemaker Center, when one era becomes forever intertwined with another, and one coach see his own reflection in the accomplishments of another.
“That would mean a great deal to me for the simple reason that more people would appreciate my teams,” Jucker said, “my almost forgotten teams. The students, they never even heard of us. A lot of the people there have forgotten about us already except the old-time boosters.”
The old coach watches UC on television when he gets the chance. What he sees is a team with the ingredients of a national champion. “They’re so strong and quick,” he said. “They can shoot. They can do everything.”
Just like Jucker’s teams.
Remember?
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