Popular Post Sterns78 Posted January 28 Popular Post Share Posted January 28 Kudos to Denver's double OT win against South Dakota. Tommy Bruner was special, as always. The Mitchell Report said since 2010, only 13 players have scored that many against a Division I opponent. Kudos to Stewart on his 44 points, both accomplished with two extra periods, but nonetheless special. https://thesummitleague.org/news/2024/1/26/mens-basketball-the-mitchell-report-tommy-bruners-signature-moment-and-game-leads-denver-to-instant-classic.aspx For you younger readers, I share one of my many special basketball memories at ORU. Anthony Roberts led the nation in scoring but finished second to Freeman Williams of Portland State as I recall. In 1977, ORU went to the NIT when the NCAA field was much smaller, and Anthony "Woosie" Roberts scored 65 points. In regulation. With no 3-point line. Against future NBA star Greg Ballard. Against Oregon, the #5 defensive team in the nation. Scoring more than the average points they allowed against a whole team. Oh, and Woosie scored 66 points less than 3 weeks earlier. Only 3 players have scored more against a Division 1 opponent: Calvin Murphy, Pete Maravich, and Kevin Bradshaw. 7 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave Posted January 28 Share Posted January 28 Attended that NIT game. Bought tickets at mid-court, basket height and enjoyed the show between Woosie and Ballard. Would have better if we would have won but still a historic night of Titan b-ball. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Titan Posted January 28 Share Posted January 28 It was a different game back then, but what Anthony did was very special. It was kind of like watching Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for the OKC Thunder; they both have a way of making many things look effortless. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theeagleman5 Posted January 28 Share Posted January 28 Woosie one of the smoothest players I have ever seen....incredible talent at 6'5" who could run the floor...a great passer and rebounder....best all around player in ORU history.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Woosie, Alvin Scott, Arnold Dugger. That was about it on that team. But with those three, that's about all you needed. Of course, they did have Big John at 7'6" and Roger Hilst. He was a walk-on and lived on my floor in EMR. 6-blue...Fortress. We were proud of him and cheered for Hale would put him in the game when there was a blow-out. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theeagleman5 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Ahhhh....Jerry Hale....the 4th stooge...the King of So. Idaho.... TheEagleman could tell you a few stories.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORU82 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Roberts, Scott and Dugger all on the same team, all made All American status and all were drafted into the NBA, yes I would say that was quite a team. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bogus Smith Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 1 hour ago, theeagleman5 said: Ahhhh....Jerry Hale....the 4th stooge...the King of So. Idaho.... TheEagleman could tell you a few stories.... We're listening....... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theeagleman5 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Coach Hale was a really nice man...just not the sharpest coach around...and it wouldn't be fair to talk bad about the guy after he's gone...let's just say that OR probably should have interviewed a few more candidates after Ken Trickey departed....maybe some others can shed light on how Jerry Hale got hired??.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 I have no inside info on Hale but I just read an obit about him on Southern Idaho's site. He was a very successful coach on the JuCo level. He played with Eddie Sutton under Coach Iba at OkSt. He followed Eddie as coach at Southern Idaho. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theeagleman5 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Well there ya go....Jerry Hale was hired because he probably came highly recommended by Eddie Sutton and Oral had always wanted to hire Eddie but never could grab him so he took the next best thing....still TheEagleman doesn't think it was the best decision although Hale did bring ORU HOFer Arnold Dugger with him......Dugger was a really good player sort of in the McBride mold but Arnold was a very physical PG....really good defender who worked out and had huge strong arms and body.....Dugger had a buzzer beater in the NIT at MSG vs. Memphis State in 1975 drilling a jumper from the top of the key....great game won by ORU 97-95.....here's one small Jerry Hale story......i think it was the 2nd game of his ORU tenure we had won our opener at home and we go on the road to College Station vs. a really good Texas A&M team....TheEagleman traveled with the team and was there on press row....big crowd very loud and close game down to the wire....we had some foul trouble and ORU low on players.....in the final 30 seconds Dugger fouls out and off the bench comes true freshman Jeff Holtgrewe much to my surprise....now Holtgrewe looked like a total deer in the headlights...he was a small white kid from maybe Iowa or somewhere.....ORU has the ball and a 1 point lead and just like the scene from Hoosiers as soon as the ball is inbounded the A&M coach is screaming to foul Holtgrewe if he gets the ball which he does......the scared looking kid goes to the foul line with about 10 seconds left and calmly drills both FTs to put ORU up 3 and this is pre-3 point line.....the Aggies get a basket in the final seconds but the Titans hold on to win a monster road game 84-83 in a tough building.....still to this day can't figure why Coach Hale put Holtgrewe in the game in that spot and honestly the kid hardly played the rest of the season....but there he was in College Station hitting those two huge FTs with an angry crowd going nuts.....Hale would have taken a beating if Holtgrewe missed those FTs.....but I guess it was Expect A Miracle!....I will just say that Jerry was a bit quirky.....but again he was a super nice man...... 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theeagleman5 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 TheEagleman was probably too hard on Coach Hale in retrospect.....i have told this story before but my late father and I travelled to Blacksburg, VA back in January 1977 (I graduated in 1976) to watch ORU play Virginia Tech....we arranged to get into the afternoon shoot around thanks to my friend on the team Kevin Dublynn and also Anthony Roberts....it was good to see some of the guys again.....Jerry Hale recognized me and came over and had a very nice conversation with my dad and left us two very nice tickets for the game that night near the ORU bench.....so there's that.....just a super nice guy who made some kind of strange coaching decisions but ORU did make the NIT in 1976 and 1977 under his leadership back when the NCAA only allowed like 28 teams so the NIT was a lot bigger deal...... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmh8286 Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Jeff Holtgrewe was from southeast Iowa near where my wife is from (as was Steve Bontrager), and I believe there was some familiarity between families, or something. I'll have to check. Jeff went on to become a physician, but has been stricken with health issues in recent years that have limited his abilities. Whatever his shortcomings were while at ORU, Jerry Hale seemed to have a pretty good record all three seasons he was there. In reading a brief interview of him around that time, he couldn't really explain why he resigned. Mostly he said he wanted to spend more time with his family. After ORU he left coaching, went to work for Parker Drilling, and I guess worked for them for the duration. He never looked back, and said for the most part he never missed coaching. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Titan Posted January 30 Share Posted January 30 Jerry was a great guy as was his entire family; I played with his oldest son Mike my sophomore (and only) year at Jenks, and of course his younger brother Steve was a high school All-American at Jenks and went on to star at North Carolina for Dean Smith. They were all just really great people. From what I remember, the knock on Hale was recruiting (or lack thereof). Several people had Oral's ear in those days, not the least of which was Dr. Jim Winslow, who was so instrumental in the building of The City of Faith. The story I heard was that Winslow convinced Oral that ORU could do much better in recruiting with a new coach, which led to Hale's resignation/dismissal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmh8286 Posted January 31 Share Posted January 31 6 hours ago, tmh8286 said: Jeff Holtgrewe was from southeast Iowa near where my wife is from (as was Steve Bontrager), and I believe there was some familiarity between families, or something. I'll have to check. Jeff went on to become a physician, but has been stricken with health issues in recent years that have limited his abilities. It doesn't really matter, but to complete the above topic, Holtgrewe actually came to ORU from my wife's home town of Mt. Pleasant, IA. His dad was the basketball coach at Iowa Wesleyan College in Mt. Pleasant. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrueBlue82 Posted January 31 Share Posted January 31 6 hours ago, Old Titan said: The story I heard was that Winslow convinced Oral that ORU could do much better in recruiting with a new coach, which led to Hale's resignation/dismissal. Winslow was an interesting guy who definitely had Oral's ear back in the day. But, needless to day, he didn't follow the approach of "staying in your lane". 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORU40 Posted January 31 Share Posted January 31 29 minutes ago, TrueBlue82 said: Winslow was an interesting guy who definitely had Oral's ear back in the day. But, needless to day, he didn't follow the approach of "staying in your lane". Winslow was really the #2 guy at ORU for a while, when Oral fired Ken Hayes the week before Christmas several years after Hale's tenure, Oral didn't go to the meeting to tell his basketball coach of the decision to let him go... he sent Winslow! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORUTerry Posted January 31 Share Posted January 31 That was a weird time for ORU basketball. I think the quick success made people think that what was accomplished by Trickey was ‘easy’. The people around Oral certainly got outside their ‘lane’ as @TrueBlue82 said and made a lot of boneheaded moves. I worked at Parker Drilling while I attended ORU (+30 hours during school/full time in the summer) and met Jerry Hale several times. He was a very nice guy… even to a 19-20 kid. Whatever happened to Jim Winslow? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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