Amazing Tales from Hog Heaven by Nate Allen

Author:Nate Allen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Published: 2013-08-30T00:00:00+00:00

PART TWO:

BASKETBALL

Don’t Eat, Don’t Sleep

Justin Daniel, one of Fayetteville High’s better all-round athletes in the 1960s who signed a pro baseball contract after playing Razorback basketball, recalled some basketball pep talks by coach Glen Rose. Called “Gloomy Glen,” Rose was almost as well-known for being taciturn as he was for being All-America both in football and basketball as a Razorback and for being the Razorbacks’ winningest basketball coach until Nolan Richardson surpassed him.

“Before a game would start,” Daniel recalled, “Coach Rose would say, ‘Now, boys. You’re not very tall. You’re not very big. You are going to have to out-quick them. But the main thing is, you can’t get any better by eating or sleeping.’”

Best Justin could figure, it meant don’t overeat and don’t sleep too much, but work out instead.

“That was his little speech,” Daniel said, “that he had a few times a year. Other guys that were on the team after I was said, ‘He’s still making that speech. You can’t get any better eating and sleeping.’ He was a dandy.”

A Standing O for the Big O

Tommy Rankin confessed that he was one of many Razorbacks who combined to “hold” Oscar Robertson to 56 points. An eventual NBA and collegiate Hall of Famer, Robertson scored 56 against Arkansas to pace the University of Cincinnati to a 96-62 victory over Glenn Rose’s 1958 Southwest Conference Championship Razorbacks in the consolation game of the NCAA Midwest Regional.

“Oscar showed us everything in the world that night,” Tommy said. “He was that good. It was just a great display of talent. Nobody could stop him. He was just awesome. He left [the game] with two minutes to go and 56 points. Twenty-thousand people gave him a standing ovation, and I was one of them. He did everything. He could have scored 66 instead of 56. I was the third one to get on him, picking him up at midcourt, and I was talking to him. He looked down at me from the top of the circle and hit the bottom of the bucket. Finally, one of our players told me to quit telling him to shoot because that wasn’t helping at all. We went into a zone and still couldn’t stop him. But that year we were ranked like 12th or 14th in the nation. So for an Arkansas team not supposed to do anything, it was a great year. We weren’t supposed to win, but we’ve got our banner down at Walton Arena right now.”

Rebel Without a Pause

Rankin was quite the outside shooter in his Jonesboro High School days and was recruited hotly by the Ole Miss Rebels. He was influenced on his Ole Miss visit to sign with Arkansas by a Rebel without a pause.

“Country Graham was the Ole Miss basketball coach,” Rankin said, “Country knew he was fighting Arkansas recruiting me, with it being the first year of Barnhill Fieldhouse. He looked out the gym door of Ole Miss and said, ‘I know Arkansas has a new gym. Son, we’re building a new gym here at Ole Miss and you can play in that.

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