Basketball changes, that is just the nature of the game. Even if the game itself does not change, because after all, the whole point is to put a leather ball in a round hoop and do it more times than the other team, things still change, and in the 1974-1975 season, things were changing more…
When Norman Pilgrim left Commerce after a decade at the helm with two LSC titles and two NAIA appearances, one of Pilgrim’s players, Phil Andrews took over for one season and the results was a 9-18 season. It was a time for the ET athletic department to look for a coach who was seasoned and…
Norman Pilgrim’s time as Head Basketball Coach at East Texas State can be described in one word: challenging. He had success, won conference championships, took his teams to the NAIA postseason and posted winning records. He was also in inadvertent party to some historical moments in not just program history, but college basketball history. After…
After 5 seasons, 4 conference championships, 3 trips to the NAIA basketball tournament, and a national title, Bob Rogers’ stock had risen in the coaching universe. He had become a hot commodity, and this led him to being named head basketball coach at Texas A&M University at the end of the 1957 season. The Lions…
Every Coach, regardless of how good they are, has difficult or rough seasons. Sometimes they even happen after Championship seasons. For Lion Coach Bob Rogers, he was no exception to this happening. In his first three seasons, Rogers had won three straight Conference Championships, three straight NAIA District 4 Championships, and had gone to the…
It takes a lot to be a Champion. A lot of games played, a lot of miles traveled, a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. Then, and only then, comes the treasure. For the East Texas State Lions, the 1950’s midpoint saw them make serious back to back runs in the NAIA National Tournament. Two…
Bob Rogers first season in Commerce saw the Lions go the furthest they ever had as the reached the NAIA Final four, the first of 3 appearances in school history. After countless conference titles and NAIA tournament appearances, it was as ever a time to make another run at a national championship. It would hard…
In the early 1950’s Lion Basketball hit a bit of a rut. Milburn Smith, who would coach arguably the greatest Lion Football team ever in 1952, coached the Lion Basketball team to a 13-9 record in 1950, before taking over a Lion football program that would be dominant from 1951-1953 and then Jack Woodruff came…
Ask anyone who knows anything about what East Texas State College was like in the 1950’s and many will call it “The Golden Fifties.” In addition to becoming a full fledged State College and making a name for itself as an emerging regional educational power, but would end up being a major collegiate power in…
Year 3 for Darrell Tully’s East Texas State squad was roughly what one would have expected. He had a winning record, contention for conference championships, and in the hunt for the NAIA postseason. It would be his final season before heading south to the Houston area where he would become one of the most notable…
After 9 seasons and 105 wins, East Texas State basketball coach Dennis Vinzant decided to leave Commerce and hand the reigns over to his trusty assistant Darrell Tully. Tully was not just some assistant coach, he was an all time Lion great way before he took the head basketball coaching job. From 1935-1939, Tully was…
Dennis Vinzant’s East Texas State Teachers College Lions were starting making going to Kansas City a habit at the end of the year, and for the 1942 Lions, it was a start of some adversity that would lay the groundwork for the great teams to come in an era with so much uncertainty. After making…
Dennis Vinzant’s name is not usually mentioned in the names of the great Lion Basketball coaches, but for the pre World War II era and the college students that made up the greatest generation, it was Vinzant that steadied so much of the athletic department at East Texas State Teacher’s College during that time frame.…
In these chronicles, or tales, or whatever you wish to call them, some of them are longer than others and back in 1936, close to 90 years ago, it is a given that basketball was much different today than it is now. The game has evolved (and for the worst in the past decade if…
It has been so hard to believe that 365 days ago today, Lion Nation lost a fan, a former player, a student of sports and sports writing, and a Lion of Old ET to the core. Others lost a husband, a loving father, and I lost my best friend. Russell McLean’s passing this time last…
J.V. Sikes is a coaching legend in the annals of East Texas State Lion history. A northeast Texas native from Leonard, Sikes was a 3 sport letterman at Texas A&M University before he got into coaching. In 1929, Sikes left Southeast Texas and came north to coach the freshman at East Texas State Teachers College…
Mark Twain once said about the game of golf, that “Golf is a good walk that is spoiled.” I know that first hand. I have been learning how to play the game for the past 5 years and I slowly but surely am getting better, but I hate the slowly part. That being said, being…
I love two things, history and basketball. I read a lot because in my 38 years it amazes me how things have progressed from the time I was coming home as a newborn from St. Paul’s Medical in Dallas to the current day. How much our society has evolved and changed from 10, 20, 30…
Note: I have written a lot about historic teams and their seasons, but this one was special to Me because I actually got experience it as a student, going to these games, seeing the school rally around this team, and getting to watch someone I had known of since my days of growing up in…
Editor’s Note: This Article was published by the Dallas Morning News in November of 1985. It was written by Sam Blair and is not the work of The Lion Wire or any of the staff or the writers. It is here for reading enjoyment purposes only and every attempt has been taken to ensure the…
