Ramblers: Loyola Chicago 1963 — The Team that Changed the Color of College Basketball
On March 23, 1963, Chicago’s Loyola Ramblers defeated the Cincinnati Bearcats in a thrilling overtime game to win the NCAA college basketball championship. The significance? Four of Loyola’s four starters were black, in defiance of the era’s unspoken guidelines for college basketball, which dictated that a team could start two black players on the road and three at home. Lenehan interviews the surviving team members as well as many of the Ramblers’ opponents in addition to doing extensive research into the print accounts of the season. There’s plenty here for basketball-history buffs, but the book glows brightest in its re-creation of the racial climate in the early 1960s, including a harrowing account of James Meredith’s attempt to register as a student at the University of Mississippi. Lenehan also profiles the late, enigmatic Ramblers coach, George Ireland, who emerges as a stubborn man motivated only by a desire to win. Player opinions on Ireland varied from bitter dislike to respect. This is an important and enlightening history of a key season in the journey from segregated college sports to the games we enjoy today. --Wes Lukowsky