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Post by Commissioner on Apr 2, 2023 21:49:51 GMT -5
Jackson.
Simply labeled “Jackson” in the Record Book, according the Varsity News this 1919 opponent, which manhandled the Titans 28-9, was a team from the Jackson YMCA.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 2, 2023 22:00:12 GMT -5
Lombard College.
Lombard College was founded in 1851 in Galesburg, Illinois by the Universalist Church. Originally called the Illinois Liberal Institute, a major fire damaged much of the college in 1855, and the college was rebuilt with a gift from Benjamin Lombard (1815–1882), a Massachusetts-born farmer and businessman, and renamed for its benefactor. Carl Sandberg, the poet, attended Lombard.
In athletics, Lombard competed in the Illinois Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (IIAC) from 1910 to 1929. The Titans played Lombard four times between 1924 and 1928, losing all four. Lombard was something of a power during this time—it competed in the National AAU Tournament in Kansas City in both 1924 and 1925, generally considered the national championship at the time. It won the IIAC championship in 1929, but that would be its last season—it became an early casualty of the Great Depression and closed in 1930.
Although it was neither merged into nor bought out by crosstown Knox College, Knox took many Lombard students, maintained Lombard alumni records, and Lombard’s top athletes are recognized in the Knox/Lombard Hall of Fame. The last living alumnus of Lombard died in November, 2014. Lombard’s tax-exemption, however, was taken over by Meadville Theological School in Chicago, which continues today as the Meadville-Lombard Theological School, so in a small way, Lombard lives on.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 2, 2023 22:11:55 GMT -5
Loyola.
Detroit’s unbeaten 1910-11 team closed out the season with a 70-16 thrashing of “Loyola.” I had always assumed this was our old friend Loyola of Chicago, but as it turns out, probably not. Loyola’s Record Book is pretty steadfast that it did not field a team until 1913-14. And while the Titans (nee Tigers) were very good—their closest game was a 17 point win over Olivet—the score is a bit suspicious for beating any collegiate team. Plus, in those days there was very limited travel. It’s not clear if the game was played at home or away, but otherwise the 1911 Titans traveled no further west than Ann Arbor, while Loyola’s early opponents were typically in the greater Chicago area, with the occasional excursion to South Bend or to colleges in downstate Illinois and Indiana. It’s doubtful we would have played a team as distant as Loyola of Maryland, and their Record Book doesn’t list us on their schedule. Loyola of New Orleans seems even more unlikely, and if you were wondering, Loyola Marymount in California was not chartered until later in 1911. I’ve wondered if the game may have been against a local high school, but I’m not aware of any “Loyola” high school in Southeast Michigan, Toledo, or Windsor at the time.
So here's my best guess: A story in the Varsity News on December 4, 1959 (a game report on the Titans' season-opening 106-50 thumping of Assumption) says the game was Detroit's biggest margin of victory since a 1910 game against “Toledo Loyola.” It turns out that in those days there was a “Loyola Club” at St. Mary’s Church in Toledo, a young men’s club. The date of the 1910-11 game against "Loyola" is uncertain, but almost certainly was played in the winter of 1911. The VN says the game was played in 1910, but that seems a simple error based on it being the 1910-11 season. I'm guessing that the Loyola Club of St. Mary's, Toledo, fielded a team, and that that was our 1911 opponent, simply because I can't find any other more probable opponent.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 2, 2023 22:18:36 GMT -5
Mexico.
In the Titan Record Book scores for the 1940-41, there is a game against an opponent, “Mexico.” Really? We just took on the whole country?
In fact, “Mexico” is just like “Iowa” or “Minnesota”—a team from the University of Mexico. The University of Mexico dates its roots back to a 1551 charter from King Carlos I as the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico, making it the oldest University in the New World. In 1910 the anti-clerical government of Porfirio Diaz gave the University a makeover, secularizing the education, giving it some independence from the government, and renaming it the National Autonomous University of Mexico. In enrollment, it is today the largest university in Latin America.
The Mexicans travelled through the U.S. in the winter of 1941, plsying games in Nebraska, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, and finally, Detroit. The publicity releases were careful to note that the Mexicans made the trip during their semester break, not missing classes. In a preview that is rather embarrassing to read today, the Varsity News noted that “the Mexicans ... will bring a team remarkable for the unpronouncibility of the names of its players.” Kind of ironic, from a University whose teams often featured players of ethnic European descent with names such as Skryzycki and Lukaszewicz, and given that the masthead of the News that year includes, among others, Blaesser, Labadie, Najduch, de Graeve, Carzoli, Garbinski, Grygier, Psuja, Van Wiermeersch, and Michalkie, among others. But these were different times, and to people who were perfectly used to having friends named Przybylski and Terlecki, but who had never seen a person of Mexican or Central or South American ancestry, I suppose a name like Hidalgo Bastidias seemed quite exotic and hard to pronounce.
For the record, the "unpronouncible" Mexican starters were team captain Humberto Salazar, Rudolfo Diaz, Carlos Elias, Roberto Hernandez, and Gabriel Hidalgo Bastidias. Others on the squad included Ignatico Sarrelanque, Angel Rodriguez, and Francisco Guerrero.
The game was played on January 28, 1941, and Titans won handily, 58-33. Unfortunately the Varsity News coverage provided little detail on the game besides the final score, and that the Titans' Joe Jarrett scored 8 points.
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Post by nctitan on Apr 2, 2023 23:38:47 GMT -5
Collegiate. In the Record Book, the Titans’ first ever opponent is identified simply as “Collegiate.” I had zero clue as to who this was until stumbling across an article on the founding of Titan basketball in the Varsity News of February 9, 1927. That story reports that the opponent was “the Collegiate Institute of Windsor.” So, who was that? Some research reveals that from 1871 until 1973 there was a high school called the Windsor Collegiate Institute in our fair Canadian neighbor city. It was not uncommon for early teams, at UofD and elsewhere, to play high schools, and we know that year’s team played Detroit's Del Rey High School. I am guessing that the Collegiate Institute of Windsor was the Titans first ever opponent. I have to dig through boxes in my attic, but I think my mother graduated from Windsor Collegiate. It was like a junior college teaching high school grads bookkeeping and subjects like that.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 7:23:31 GMT -5
Fort Wayne
(Oops, missed the alphabetical order on this one)
Over the 1944 and 1945 seasons the Titans played (and beat) “Fort Wayne” three times. Fort Wayne definitely wasn't today's Horizon League member, or any variation of it, since that wasn't launched in any form for a few more years.
It took a bit of sleuthing, but it appears that this Fort Wayne was another military base unit, as a reference in the Varsity News after the last of those games, on January 6, 1945, described the game as played on “the soldiers home court,” and a certain “Garrison” leading “the battle-scarred soldiers” with 12 points. Baer Army Base (today the Ft. Wayne Air National Guard Station) was located in Ft. Wayne during WWII. Also in Ft. Wayne was Camp Thomas Scott, used to train soldiers in railroad operations. After the war it held some 600 German POWs, and then was decommissioned. I’m guessing "Ft. Wayne" was the Baer base, but don’t know.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 7:27:49 GMT -5
Ohio U
The Titan Record Book lists a January 4, 1936 game as a 36-29 win over "Ohio U.", so it seems pretty obvious that this was the current MAC school, which is one of the oldest universities west of the Appalachians. Except it's not obvious at all, and probably this game was not against the Bobcats of Ohio University.
According to the Tower, the game was against “Ohio College” and played in Cleveland, one day after the Titans met Fenn College (now Cleveland State) in the “Mistake by the Lake.” The Varsity News doesn’t mention the game at all, either as a preview before or result after Christmas (the game would have been played during Christmas break), so it is of no help. But the Ohio U. Record Book, which is one of the more complete ones, doesn’t list the Titans as playing Detroit that year. So was Ohio U.—which was clearly known as Ohio U. long before 1936, i.e. it was not called Ohio “College” in 1936 with a name change to “University” coming later—up in Cleveland for some reason, and playing the Titans on a neutral floor, with an omission in the OU Record Book? Or was this some other school? I’m not aware of any school in Cleveland at the time using a variation of “Ohio College” (for example, “Ohio Business College”). This one may remain a mystery. I like the Record Book’s assumption that this was Ohio U., just because it looks better than some now-defunct bumpkin school.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 7:42:45 GMT -5
Ontario Aggies
Per the Record Book, in 1946 the Titans won lopsided victories in both ends of a home and home series with the “Ontario Aggies.” My educated guess is that this was the Ontario Agricultural College, located in Ridgetown, Ontario. Ridgetown is at the base of the Ontario Peninsula, about 60 miles from Windsor. At the time it was an “associated” college of the University of Toronto. Today it is part of the University of Guelph.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 7:50:12 GMT -5
Polish Seminary.
According to the Titan Record Book, in 1914 the “Tigers” played to a 23-23 tie with “Polish Seminary.” I presume that this was Sts. Cyril and Methodius Seminary in Orchard Lake. Founded in 1879, the school was originally located on St. Aubin Avenue between Forest Avenue and Garfield Street in Detroit. It moved to Orchard Lake in 1909. The Seminary, St. Mary’s Prep, and St. Mary’s College shared some facilities but operated as separate administrative units. Sts. Cyril and Methodius, which closed in 2022, was with some regularity referred to as the "Polish Seminary," so it stands to reason that was the Titan opponent. Detroit also played St. Mary's College quite regularly in the early era, a total of 17 times between 1912 and 1945.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 9:17:42 GMT -5
Quito.
In January, 1948, the Titans defeated “Quito,” 49-36, behind Chuck Kemen’s 20 points. “Quito” was a team from what the Varsity News called “The University of Quito.”
The team was coached by American Bancroft Butler, coach of the Titan freshman team in the early 1930s, and son of Michael “Dad” Butler, the Track & Field Coach and Athletic Department Trainer at the UofD from 1927 through 1944 (“Dad” Butler was inducted into the Titan Hall of Fame in 1977). I didn’t find anything on how Bancroft came to be coaching in Ecuador, or how he brought his team to the U.S., but the Varsity News reports that after the game UofD students held a dance in honor of the visitors.
In the game itself, per the Varsity News, Fortunato Munoz led the Quito squad in scoring with 18 points. I’m quite sure the News had no real idea who Munoz was, but in fact Munoz, who died in 2010, is the greatest basketball player in Ecuadorian history, and in 1948 was in his prime. He played on his first Ecuadorian championship team at age 14, and was a fixture in the sport in Ecuador for over a quarter century. He played in the 1950 FIBA World Championship, the only one for which Ecuador has every qualified, where he was the #3 scorer in the competition, and played professionally into his forties. He later authored four books, including "History of Ecuadorian Basketball," which would probable shed more light on all this, if I could find a copy, plus “Basketball: Learn by Playing,” and “Basketball: Only Defense.”
Anyway, that’s the answer, right? “Quito” was the University of Quito. Well, no.
In point of fact, as a former resident of Ecuador, I’ll vouch that there neither is nor has been a “University of Quito.” But there are some candidates that Americans might call Quito University. My first thought was that “Quito University” was a bastardized reference to the Universidad Central del Ecuador, or in English, the Central University of Ecuador, which is located in Quito and is the oldest university in the country, established in 1620. But given the Catholic connection and all, it occurred to me that “University of Quito” might have been referencing the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador, also located in Quito. The latter was founded only in 1946, and it seems possible that it might have been hiring Americans at that time to help set up a more American-style university. A third possibility would be the National Polytechnical University, also in Quito and founded in 1869. There are other colleges in Quito, as well, but these three strike me as those most likely to have been referred to simply as “the University of Quito.”
But then I realized that I was thinking about it too much like an American, where we’re used to the idea that colleges and universities sponsor athletic teams. This has not historically been true outside of North America, and that got me thinking of other possibilities that, in fact, may be more likely. The dominant professional soccer team in Ecuador is actually called “Liga Deportiva Universitaria de Quito,”--in English, “University Sports League of Quito”—which today is usually just called "Liga" or "Liga de Quito" for short. The club got its start in 1918 when a group of students at the Central University joined together and began playing soccer under the name “Club Universitario” (literally, “student club”). They had to find their own playing field, pay for uniforms, travel, etc. In the 1930s, the team was formally organized as a sports club, still based out of but independent from the University, which wore uniforms with a big “U” on the chest, for Universitaria. Liga, as it is now generally called, played in amateur events and tournaments in Ecuador in the 1930s and 40s, but converted itself to a professional team with the founding of the Pichincha Non-Amateur Football Association in the early 1950s (Pichincha is a large volcano that looms over the city of Quito, and its base is also the site of the Battle of Pichincha, which secured Ecuador’s independence from Spain—we used to get Battle of Pichincha Day off work). Today, Liga’s official name is still Liga Deportiva Universtaria. Although best known for its professional soccer teams, Liga has a history of sponsored teams in baseball, swimming, boxing, table tennis, and, of course, basketball. In 1954 it sent a team to tour Europe.
I’m not otherwise aware of Liga sending a team to the U.S. in 1948, but It makes a certain amount of sense that the club would have hired an American coach and decided to tour the U.S., especially if, by the late 1940s, it was, like the soccer teams, converting to semi-pro or professional status. And it’s natural that Americans, without a lot of available info on Ecuadorian sports or higher education, might have referenced the squad from Quito called Universitario and touring the U.S. in the winter of 1948 with a big “U” on their uniforms as “Quito University” or “University of Quito.” Here’s the Club’s fight song, which also let’s you see the Club’s “U” logo:
Ah, but there’s another kicker. Fortunato Munoz was long associated with Liga’s arch rival, “Club Athletico,” or “Athletic,” based in the port city of Guayquil, where I used to live. Guayaquil and Quito have a fierce rivalry, in sports, politics, business, everything. (For trivia buffs, Thomas Nast, the guy who created the emblem of the Elephant for Republicans and the Donkey for Democrats, and also the modern image of Santa Claus, died of malaria in Guayaquil in 1902). By 1948, I’m pretty sure that Munoz, then 25 years old, was already playing for Athletic. Munoz toured the U.S., Canada and Mexico in 1949 with the Ecuadorian National Team, but I can’t find any Ecuadorian references to a 1948 tour by the national team. But maybe the 1948 squad also was the national team, with several players from Liga? Or perhaps Munoz was loaned to Liga for the tour? Despite the rivalry, such things would not be unheard of.
In any case, from the sources readily available to me, I just can’t be sure. If I were a betting man, though, I’d guess that it was a team sponsored by Liga Deportivo Universitaria, and somehow Munoz was playing on it.
Meanwhile, a loose translations of lyrics to the Universitario fight song:
We are the students, happy, dreamers We go through life In pursuit of an illusion We carry the cup of life in our hands A glass of beer that makes the heart glad The calculated steps The well-equipped fans The master tactician will soon join together The goals by the loads The crazy screams The laughter and the tears will soon ignite
CHORUS We always raise high the colors of the Liga We are the kings of the dribble, And macho in our play Our house is a party Because we have a great team Our torch is always high White, Blue, and Red Champions!
The Sporting League is ready to fight Our boys are valiant, and used to winning We start the game, and soon the ball With fury is making the nets tremble The calculated steps The well-equipped fans The master tactician will soon join together The goals by the loads The crazy screams The laughter and the tears will soon ignite
Repeat Chorus Champions! Champions! Champions!
If only we had such a song...
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 10:15:39 GMT -5
Rose Polytech.
The Titans clobbered Rose Polytech, 59-21, in their only meeting, in 1918. This is one that is easily traceable, although the keepers of the Titan Record Book didn’t catch it to update the school name, as it did with most such situations. Rose Polytech is located in Terre-Haute, Indiana. It changed its name from Rose Polytech to Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in 1971, in honor of literally generations of support from the Hulman family, and continues under that name. I gave a speech there once, some years ago. Their mascot is an elephant, and I’ve got a faded but still cool t-shirt with a Rose-Hulman elephant on it.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 10:17:20 GMT -5
State Troopers.
The Record Book shows the Titans defeating “State Troopers,” 24-22, late in the 1918-19 season. As near as I can tell—-from a brief report on the game in the Varsity News on March 19, 1919 referencing the opponent as the “Michigan state troops of Pontiac”--this was a base of the Michigan State Troops Permanent Force (Michigan Constabulary), which was created in 1917 and was the forerunner of today’s Michigan State Police. The Troops were created by act of the legislature because the Michigan National Guard had been mobilized for wartime service. The Governor wanted a state force to assist local police with “internal security”—to guard against sabotage of Michigan’s factories and mines and to assist in “riot suppression” (it is hard to underestimate the war hysteria of 1917-19, triggered by Woodrow Wilson). Newspapers frequently called them the “state troops” or even the “Michigan Calvary.”
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 10:22:58 GMT -5
St. Ignatius.
Between 1916 and 1923, you can find seven Titan match-ups in the Record Book against St. Ignatius College, with the Titans compiling the odd record of 4-2-1. The tie occurred on February 25, 1922, when the clock ran out with the score at 23-23 (or maybe 21-21—-the Titan Record Book reports the former, the Varsity News game story reported the latter). But the crowd at the old University Gym was so loud that the players didn’t hear the referee’s whistle, and St. Ignatius scored again before the referee was able to get the players’ attention and stop the game to end regulation time. The Titans insisted on an overtime period, since the final basket came about 20 seconds after the ref first blew his whistle to end regulation. St. Ignatius refused, claimed the victory, and walked off. Their record book still claims it as a 25-23 victory. That St. Ignatius team was pretty good, finishing (including their claimed win in this game) at 11-3, including a win over St. Louis.
But who was St. Ignatius? Well, St. Ignatius actually isn’t defunct—this is another one of those name changes that the Record Book just missed. Rather, St. Ignatius became John Carroll College in 1923, and remained a relatively common Titan opponent through the 1960s, with two final games played in 1981 and 1988. The school is located in Cleveland, and is a pretty good Jesuit University--really quite similar to U of D. John Carroll’s last win in the series came in 1949, with the Titans winning all 11 games after that date.
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Post by ptctitan on Apr 3, 2023 11:29:41 GMT -5
Rumor has it that the 1940-41 Mexico barnstorming tour was hastily planned in the aftermath of the Leon Trotsky assassination in 1940.
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Post by Commissioner on Apr 3, 2023 21:28:21 GMT -5
St. John’s (Ohio).
A regular Titan opponent in the early part of the century, St. John’s was an all-male, Jesuit school located in Toledo. It was another victim of the Great Depression, which claimed the lives of many a small college. St. John’s closed in May 1936 due to financial problems and declining enrollment. It merged with Toledo Teachers’ College to form DeSales College, which in turn suspended operations—never to resume—after graduating the Class of ’42, six months after Pearl Harbor. (Lee Knorek, a very good center who starred on the 1942-43 Titans, spent a few years fighting the Japs, and returned to the Titans for one season after the war, transferred to U of D from De Sales when the latter closed up shop.)
The Titans went 20-5 against St. John’s between the 1910 season and 1934. Early on, however, the series was quite competitive. The Premo-Poretto poll, an effort by St. Bonaventure Professor Pat Premo and computer programmer Phil Poretta to create a season-ending poll from the years before there were polls, placed St. John’s 19th in the country in 1921, a season in which the Johnnies went a perfect 15-0, including 41-22 rout and a 22-20 edging of the Titans. But by the 1930s the Titans had clearly outgrown St. John’s, winning the final 13 games in the series
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