The Frank Ramsey Interview
By:
Michael D. McClellan
|
Tuesday, August 13th, 2002
UK was
forced to sit out the 1952-53 basketball season because
of violations that occurred before your arrival in
Lexington. How difficult was that for you at the
time?
It was something that you just handled.
We were just normal students like everybody else.
We continued to take classes as work towards earning our
degrees. I believe Cliff Hagan and Lou
Tsioropoulos would eventually earn their masters
degrees. Cliff, Lou and myself were all selected
in the draft by Red Auerbach.
Despite a cancelled
1952–53 schedule, the Wildcats had stayed together and
practiced regularly during their year off. How
close was that team?
We were very close. We continued to practice two
or three days a week together. Only six varsity
players
were on scholarship at that point. Twelve freshmen
were brought in that year. As I said, we
continued going to class and doing those sorts of
things.
Your 1953-54 Wildcats
resumed basketball in grand fashion, finishing the
season undefeated at 25-0. What do you remember
most about that run and the SEC playoff win over LSU?
There was no SEC tournament at that time. It was a
round-robin format, and we ended up playing LSU in a
playoff to decide who would go to the NCAA tournament.
The game was played in Nashville. It was a tough
game but we prevailed by six points to stay undefeated.
The NCAA ruled that
three UK seniors – yourself, Cliff Hagan, and Lou
Tsioropoulos – all had enough credits to graduate
(which technically made you graduate students) and were
ineligible to compete in postseason play. What
stands out most about both the ruling and Adolph
Rupp’s decision to refuse the berth?
There was nothing to it. Coach Rupp made the
decision not to play in the tournament that year, and
that was it. As you mentioned, Cliff, Lou and
myself were academically ineligible because we were
considered graduate students. Back then the rules
were different. Today students can go school five
years and not jeopardize their eligibility. It
wasn’t like that back then.
