And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: The Basketball Game That Changed American Sports [Paperback]

Frank Fitzpatrick (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Brilliant."—ESPN.com

(ESPN.com )

"Social change comes in unexpected increments—like the 1966 NCAA men''s basketball tournament. The 72–65 victory by Texas Western over Kentucky had tremendous social symbolism: Texas Western (today the University of Texas, El Paso) started five black players—the first such occurrence in an NCAA championship—and they thoroughly outplayed the all-white Kentucky squad, coached by Adolph Rupp, collegiate sports'' intransigent exemplar of white supremacy."—New York Times Book Review

(New York Times Book Review )

"An admirably researched account of the barrier-shattering championship game that slam-dunked segregated college basketball. Outside of Jackie Robinson''s baseball debut, perhaps no single sporting event had so profound a social effect as the 1966 NCAA basketball championship. . . Fitzpatrick balances present-day interviews with the former players and surviving coaches with contemporaneous accounts to expose the sporting fraternity''s subtle and not-so-subtle biases. . . Defying stereotypes and shrugging off tremendous stress, the Miners controlled the game and won; it was the Wildcats who were flummoxed. The game''s ''message'' was lost on Rupp, who, despite a loss that would haunt him to his grave, remained steadfast in his defense of racial segregation and held out against recruiting black players until the 1970s. Although Rupp has his apologists—some of his former players try to soft-pedal his interdict on nonwhite players—he comes across as a small-minded bigot who set race relations in Kentucky back several years, if not decades. Fair but devastating in its portrait of persistent prejudice, this is a landmark account of a landmark event."—Kirkus Reviews

(Kirkus Reviews )

About the Author

Frank Fitzpatrick is a sportswriter for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Product Details

• Paperback: 264 pages
• Publisher: Bison Books (September 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803269013
• ISBN-13: 978-0803269019
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #125,019 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Why the dunk was outlawed, January 12, 2001

By 

C. David Eagle (Austin, TX United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: The Basketball Game That Changed American Sports (Paperback)

This is the best book available on the monumental historic 1966 NCAA men's basketball championship of Texas Western, the first team to start 5 blacks in the Final Four. It is very well researched, with an extensive bibliography. The civil rights impact is well dealt with, as are the racial attitudes of several of the major players. The Kentucky coach, Adolph Rupp, is treated fairly and the reader is left to make his own decision about his character. This is tricky to handle, because his attitudes had to be presented on a backdrop of his times and environment.

I have two minor criticisms of the book, which prevent me from awarding it 5 stars. The first is that the racial attitudes of Don Haskins, the Texas Western coach, were not clearly portrayed. We are left with the impression that he cared about the game more than anything, and we know that he was a little bit country, but we never really find out whether he harbored any prejudices.

Second, while the race issue is well dealt with by Fitzpatrick, he does not deal in depth with the problem with gentlemen's agreements. This refers, for example, to the rule of thumb "2 at home, 3 on the road, 4 when behind" that apparently many coaches used to define their quota for black players. A discussion of this, including who knew about these agreements and how widespread was their impact, would definitely have been in order in this book which is trying to place that basketball game in its spot in history.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting topic, but not a quick read, October 20, 2003

By 

George (Martinsville, Va United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: The Basketball Game That Changed American Sports (Paperback)

The author has researched well this game in 1966, but the writing leaves a little to be desired. I felt the author could have done a better job of caputring the players as charachters in the book rather than just topics of a history paper.

5.0 out of 5 stars AND THE WALLS CAME TUMBLING DOWN, September 23, 2011

By 

Roger M. Yamamoto "ROGER M. YAMAMOTO" (AIEA, HI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: The Basketball Game That Changed American Sports (Paperback)

I HAVE NO COMPLAINTS. THE TRANSACTION WENT SMOOTHLY. I'M READING THE BOOK RIGHT NOW. I'M ENJOYING READING THE BOOK.
THANK YOU,
ROGER