THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 22, 1995 TAG: 9502220555
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ED MILLER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. LENGTH: Long : 105 lines
Eleanor Roosevelt was among those invited to the first CIAA basketball tournament, held March 7 through 9, 1946, at Turner's Arena in Washington, D.C.
The former first lady had another commitment and sent her regrets.
It was her loss.
To those who witnessed it, no CIAA tournament since has surpassed the first one, which ended with North Carolina College for Negroes, now North Carolina Central University, beating Virginia Union in triple overtime for the title.
LeRoy T. Walker, now president of the U.S. Olympic Committee, was an assistant coach at North Carolina College in 1946.
``I have not seen, before or since, any basketball to equal the drama,'' Walker once said.
Lem Graves, longtime sports reporter for the Norfolk Journal and Guide, was moved to write: ``It was one of those things you had to see to believe. Those who didn't see it cheated themselves out of a sports spectacle that may never be repeated before their eyes.''
And to think that most CIAA presidents and athletic directors had to be talked into holding a tournament at all. This year's men's CIAA basketball tournament, which starts today in Winston-Salem, is the league's 50th.
The conference was born in 1912 as the Colored Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, and for its first 33 years it crowned a ``visitation,'' or regular-season, champion.
In the mid-1940s, however, four coaches - John Burr of Howard, T.L. Hill of Morgan State, Harry Jefferson of Virginia State and John McLendon of North Carolina College - began to lobby for a tournament.
``We wanted to show the public how the teams played against each other in a tournament setting,'' says McLendon, who is the only surviving founder. ``We thought it might also be a way to make some money for the conference, which had very little treasury.''
It was a tough sell. Most coaches and administrators were convinced that a regular-season schedule was a better way to determine a champion. But the group, led by Hill, continued to lobby.
``He (Hill) was very eloquent, very forceful,'' McLendon said. ``When he brought it up to the conference, they could hardly refuse.''
The four coaches got the conference's approval in 1945, but they didn't get a dime in funding.
``The first thing we had to do was raise $100 each,'' McLendon said. ``I got mine from my account at Farmers and Merchants Bank in Durham.''
Washington was the natural site for the tournament, McLendon said.
``People liked to go there,'' he said. ``In those days, everybody in Washington was from CIAA schools.''
Turner's Arena was also a natural - it was one of two arenas open to blacks in those days.
Half of the CIAA's 16 teams were invited. Lincoln University was top-seeded, while McLendon's North Carolina College team was seeded fifth.
The Eagles, who became known as the ``Mighty Mites,'' had no player over 6-foot-2 and had an average height of 5-9. They ran and pressed relentlessly, a style pioneered in the CIAA by McLendon.
``We were not the best team there, talent-wise,'' North Carolina College team captain Aubrey Stanley said. ``We were the best-conditioned. Coach McLendon always felt that if you had two teams of equal ability, the better-conditioned would win.''
North Carolina College upset West Virginia State in the first round and knocked off top-seeded Lincoln in the semis.
More than 2,000 fans crammed into Turner's for the final, between the Eagles and Virginia Union.
The game was tied at 23 at the half. The lead changed 14 times as the fans went wild.
Among them was John E. Brown, a former North Carolina College football player who entered the gym wearing the most famous topcoat in CIAA history.
``It was a daytime game, and the sun was shining in through a vent, right into the faces of our players'' Walker said. ``The vent had a fan. John Brown, who was a great All-American football player, stuck his London Fog coat in there to shield the sun.''
The coat was ruined, shredded by the fan.
``All I knew was that it was very difficult to see,'' Stanley said. ``The sun was directly in our faces. He had a really beautiful trench coat, the idea of him doing that . . .''
The Eagles, down six points with 30 seconds to go, forced overtime on a shot by Stanley at the buzzer.
Virginia Union's Howard Bressant sent the game into a second overtime.
Stanley forced the third overtime on a set shot from the corner with five seconds left.
As the third overtime started, Stanley sensed that Virginia Union was through.
``I could see their chests heaving,'' he said. ``I could see them trying to catch their breath. They'd never played that all-out, up-and-down style, and weren't used to it.''
Virginia Union didn't score in the final overtime and the Eagles won going away, 54-46.
``Years later, somebody once asked me if I ever had a player like (former N.C. State star) Monte Towe,'' who was only 5-foot-4, McLendon said. ``I told them I had four of them at once.''
The tournament stayed in Washington through 1951, before moving to Baltimore for a year, and then to Durham, N.C.
``It was a great time for the tournament to begin,'' McLendon said. ``It was the end of the war and people were in a state of restlessness. It gave them an outlet.''
The members of the 1946 North Carolina College team will be honored at the CIAA's hall of fame luncheon Saturday at the Benton Convention Center in Winston-Salem. by CNB