I remember people talking about Dick Edwards starting 5 black players: Rickie Hawthorne, Connie White, John Terry, Carl Bird (Jabari's dad), and Jay Young. And that was in the 1970s, well after Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, the Black Panthers, the Third World Liberation Front, and everyone else who should have raised a little consciousness in Berkeley.

UrsaMajor said:

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SFCity:

Thank you for all that research! I agree with your speculation about the fear of blacks dominating basketball. Another (related) factor is that 3 black players = a majority of the starting lineup in basketball but only 27% in football (in the pre-unlimited substitution era). Phil Woolpert at USF was a pioneer in having more than 1 or 2 blacks on the court at the same time. (If I'm not mistaken, USF's football team with Ollie Matsen--from Washington High!--declined a bid to the Sugar Bowl because they were told they couldn't play their African Americans).

Your mention of Texas Western (now UTEP) reminds me of the ironic fact that Cal was the last NCAA championship team that was all-white.

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I think you are right about all of it. Many thought that USF was the best football team in the country in 1951, but they ended up ranked #14. The had 4 or 5 Hall of Famers and some other great players. Ollie Matson, Bob St Clair, Gino Marchetti, Ed Brown, Burl Toler (the other black player along with Matson) and more. I went with my dad to see the 1950 USF team play #4 Cal at Memorial in the rain and mud. USF's record was 7-4, and Cal had one of its greatest teams, and was 9-1-1, but USF beat Cal 13-7, and the game was not that close. Cal did go the Rose Bowl, and lost to Michigan, 14-6, I think Cal was wise not to schedule USF in 1951.

I did not realize that Cal was the last all-white team to win the NCAA. I'd guess West Virginia may have been all-white as well, finishing 2nd that year. Bob Washington, a black player, was a reserve forward on the Cal 1958 team which lost in the Western Regional Final to Seattle and Elgin Baylor, averaging 4 points a game. He played for Cal in 1956, and then had to leave school, either for financial or academic reasons, I think, but after a year away, he came back to play for Cal in 1958. He was on the same teams in 1956 and 1958 with Earl Robinson, giving Cal two black players on the roster in those years. I don't know why Washington did not play for Cal in 1959, as he may still have been eligible, and missed out on sharing in a championship, if he was eligible.