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In celebration of Georgetown’s basketball
centennial this year, the University Archives presents
an exhibit in Lauinger Library’s Gunlocke Room entitled
Georgetown Men’s Basketball 1906-1907 to 2006-2007:
Ten Coaches, Ten Players, and Ten Decades of Hoops, with
a companion exhibit entitled The NCAA Championship, 1984
in the Kerbs Exhibit Area. Brought out on view from the
Archives are scorebooks, programs, yearbook features, media
guides, schedules, citations, photographs, news clippings,
season tickets and Final Four memorabilia.
The exhibit opens with a clipping from the February 6,
1901 issue of The Washington Post headlined “Collegians
at Basket-Ball.” This account of an intramural clash
between students in the Georgetown College Prep School
(then still housed on campus) represents the earliest record
of basketball activity found in the Archives. The clipping
references plans to form a college team the following fall,
but it appears that this did not happen until the hiring
of Maurice Joyce in 1906 as Physical Instructor, when basketball
took hold as a Georgetown sport.
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Patrick Ewing, AB 1985, takes a shot.
Jersey Number: 33. Position: Center. Height: 7-0. National
Player of the Year, 1985. |
One of the ten featured coaches, Elmer Ripley, was born in the
year that basketball was invented (1891). Elmer Ripley is a legendary
figure in the sport and is known for both his playing and his
coaching. As a player, he was on the American team which won
the World Championship at the 1914-1915 San Francisco World’s
Fair. He also won a title with the New York Celtics and was voted
one of the ten best pros from 1909 to 1926. He began his coaching
career with Wagner College in 1922.
In 1927, Ripley was hired to coach the Hoyas. He had an immediate
impact and his first squad won 12 of its 13 games. He left in
1929 to coach at Yale but returned in 1938. In 1939, Georgetown
won a share of the Eastern Intercollegiate Basketball Conference
(EIBC) and in 1943 they advanced to the NCAA finals. After the
University suspended basketball because of World War II, Ripley
moved to Notre Dame where he secured an NCAA berth in 1946. He
then returned to coach at Georgetown until 1949.
Ripley continued his college coaching career after leaving Georgetown
for the third and final time. He also served as the Israeli Olympic
team coach in 1956 and the Canadian Olympic team coach in 1960.
He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1973.
One of the players featured was also a coach. Kenneth C. Engles,
BSS 1946, the only player-coach in Georgetown’s basketball
history, assumed coaching duty for the 1945-1946 season when
Elmer Ripley was unable to return from Notre Dame. The Gunlocke
Room exhibit includes a letter from Ken Engles to Elmer Ripley,
dated May 3, 1944. In the letter written to “Rip” (for
whom he had played in the 1940-1941 and 1941-1942 seasons) from “Somewhere
in England,” Engles describes how, even while serving in
the military, he has been able to continue playing basketball: “.
. . our regimental team won the division championship and ended
the season with thirteen wins and two losses. Scored 21 points
in the final play-off game and must of [sic] had a season average
of about 14 points per game.” Staff Sergeant Engles was
awarded the Purple Heart for his war service.
University President Timothy S. Healy, S.J. awards the President's
Medal to Coach John Thompson II, April 24, 1982. The exhibit
includes the photograph and the citation.
In one of the more unusual games featured in the exhibit, the
opposing team was from the People’s Republic of China.
After President Nixon and Premier Chou En-lai signed the Shanghai
Communique in 1972, exchanges between China and the U.S. developed
in the fields of science, medicine, trade, culture, and even
sports. The National Committee on U.S. China Relations (NCUSR)
facilitated official exchanges under the framework of the Shanghai
Communique and co-sponsored a five-game tour of the U.S. by the
men’s and women’s Chinese basketball teams in 1978.
In their fourth U.S. game, the Chinese defeated the Hoyas, 75-69.
Mu Tiehchu, listed by the Chinese at 7 feet 2 inches but estimated
to be somewhat taller, was dubbed “The Great Wall of China” by
U.S. players.
The Gunlocke Room and Kerbs Exhibit Area basketball exhibits
are on view through March 2007.
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