OCU Basketball and Abe Lemons

[ljbab728]

I suspect most of our posters are too young to remember when OCU was considered to be a national power in basketball. I followed them closely during that period and this is an interesting article in the Oklahoman about that.

50 years ago, Abe Lemons' Chiefs produced a stunning season | NewsOK.com

Then came a very special season. Fifty years ago Sunday, Lemons' Chiefs went to Chicago and popped national power Loyola-Chicago 106-89. Loyola had been the 1963 NCAA champ, had made the 1964 Final Four and would return to the NCAA Tournament that season in 1966.

Those '65-66 Chiefs went 29-5. They made the NCAA Tournament and started off in the Midwest Regional quarterfinals in Wichita, Kan., against Texas Western. Yes, that Texas Western. The famed Don Haskins team that surged to the NCAA championship, with an all-black starting lineup that changed the sport.

OCU jumped out early and led 20-9, but Texas Western rallied for a 43-37 halftime lead and slowly pulled away. The Chiefs lost 89-74, and Abe Lemons' greatest season was over. Texas Western went on to make history. OCU was left with only the memories. But those memories remain strong for anyone who saw the Chiefs play.

[okatty]

Abe Lemons was an Oklahoma treasure. In our day and age Abe would be a media sensation with his quick wit and one liners. There are way too many Abe stories to know which is my favorite but way up at the top of the list is the altercation Abe got into with Eddie Sutton when Abe was coaching at Texas and Eddie was at Arkansas. After a particularly heated game some players got in each others' faces and Eddie pulled one of the Texas players away and Abe saw that, went over to Eddie and said "If you ever touch one of my players again I will rip that red suit off your back and shove it up your #%@ you $&#^^$ (starts with c)." Eddie didn't appreciate that and a letter of complaint was written to DeLoss Dodds the Texas AD. DeLoss called Abe into his office and handed him the letter and asked him what he had to say for himself, expecting a denial of the language. Abe pondered over the letter and said " GD, DeLoss, doesn't c#%$##% look bad in print?"

Sorry a little off the specific OCU topic but Abe was OCU basketball in those years.

[zookeeper]

Abe was a man of incredibly quick wit. Not only was Abe Lemons a great basketball coach, but could have been a comedian. He was that funny.

I miss Frederickson Field House. It was one LOUD place. I got to see some great basketball come through Oklahoma City during the heyday of the OCU Chiefs.

[Stan Silliman]

I was an OCU student from 1961 to 1966. Besides playing on the golf team, I was sports editor of the Chieftain (it was either that or the Keshena) for 1964 and 1965 and one of the perks of that job was getting to interview Coach Lemons at his office in Frederickson.

Dry humor, rarely smiled, begrudgedly gave out compliments. Several of my basketball friends were always in his doghouse - Gary Duncan, Gene Tsoodle, Manuel Heusman, Eddie Jackson - and it was funny to squeeze a compliment out of Abe on the doghouse gang which was what these guys were always goading me to do. I wish I could remember more.