On its way to the NCAA Sweet Sixteen, the 2005-2006 men's basketball team set a new program record with 23 wins. Its 23-6 mark broke a 33-year-old record that dated back to the 1972-73 team.
But two weeks ago, the '73 Jumbos one-upped Bob Sheldon's squad when they were inducted into the New England Basketball Hall of Fame. That team went 22-4 and won the ECAC Championship, the top prize for Tufts teams at the time.
"We knew that Tufts didn't have a great basketball history then, and [coach Tom Penders] kept saying that we had to create our own legacy," said Eddie Tapscott, a sophomore point guard on that team. "We thought we had some talented players, and we wanted to show everyone that Tufts could be known as not just fine academic institution, but one that had competitive athletic programs as well."
Penders was also a solo inductee for his career as a player at the University of Connecticut and his coaching career, which started at Tufts but continued at Columbia, Fordham, URI, Texas and the University of Houston, where he is currently the head coach.
Eight of the 13 players from that Jumbo squad attended the event, held at the University of Rhode Island, and, according to Penders, all that was missing was the short shorts and bad haircuts.
"It was great to see them back together again--they hadn't missed a beat," he said. "Billy Packer from CBS pulled me aside and said 'that's an impressive looking group of guys.' They don't look 50--they look like they could take you to the hoop."
The story of that championship team actually starts the previous season. Moving to Tufts after three years coaching at the high school level, Penders led a team that had gone 1-17 the previous year to a 12-8 record.
"I was na've enough to think that we could build a successful program, and I drove them really hard," said Penders, who brought an intense conditioning regimen and a fast-paced style of play to Cousens Gym. "That first year was really amazing. It was basically the same group of guys that had won one game the year before, but we were all of a sudden winning games."
"Tom was a young and dynamic coach--very demanding and aggressive, and he wanted that type of aggression displayed on the floor," Tapscott said. "We were a full-court pressing team and ran a lot of fast breaks. It was a very fun style of basketball to play."
The '71-'72 Jumbos were named the Most Improved Team in New England, and when Penders accepted the award for Most Improved Team after the '71-'72 season, he joked that he never wanted to have to do it again.
The next year, the team fulfilled its coach's wish. Adding a nucleus of talented sophomores off the freshman squad to a group of upperclassmen eager to leave its mark on Tufts basketball, the '72-'73 Jumbos won a program-best 22 games and took the ECAC crown. League rules prohibited the team from playing in the NCAA Tournament.
"It was an extremely talented group of players; we had some real Division I talent," Penders said. "I felt that that team was good enough to win the national championship, and it was a little frustrating that we couldn't do that. We won all that we could, though."
The Jumbos started the year with pair of close wins over regional rivals WPI and Williams before a three-game sweep of the Sacred Heart Tournament blew the season wide open. The stratification of college athletics into Divs. I, II, and III didn't occur until the mid-1970s, and the '72-'73 Jumbos played many teams that now play in higher divisions.
"The divisional breakdown wasn't as clear, so they played up a lot of games, all very competitively," said Bill Gehling, current Director of Athletics and a junior at Tufts in 1972-'73. "It was a different landscape, but boy, those guys could play."
Senior Willie Young, the returning playing several different positions. Senior John White, whom Tapscott called "a coach on the floor," began the season starting at point guard, and classmate Paul Daniels also provided senior leadership.
A trio of sophomores coming off a highly successful freshman team the previous year injected some new blood and talent. Forwards Dennis Mink and Reggie combined for 30 points per game, and Tapscott traded time with White at point, eventually earning the starting spot.
"A lot of us hadn't been on that 1-17 team; we had had a winning season on the freshman team, and we sort of expected to keep winning," Tapscott said. "We combined that with juniors and seniors who wanted to end their careers on a positive note and an coach like Tom who demanded excellence, and something just clicked. It was an interesting critical mass that occurred that year."
Perhaps even greater than their on-court accomplishments was the team's effect on the Tufts community. When he took the head coaching job, Penders found a campus rife with political activism and racial tension, with very little attention (and money) paid to athletics.
"It was a very turbulent time for colleges, with the Vietnam War and Black Power movements," Penders recalled. "There were a lot of protests and a lot of division between students and faculty and no real interest in campus life or sports. But after we started practicing and playing, all that disappeared."
What took its place was an explosive mix of talent and chemistry that lit a fire under an apathetic campus community and elevated the stature of Tufts basketball across New England. Clad in new powder blue warm-ups, the Jumbos took the court to packed stands throughout the entire winter.
"We really galvanized the campus community," said Leroy Charles, a freshman on that team. "It used to be, you could count number of people at games on one hand. To see 2,000 people crammed into the stands, hanging off the rafters, sneaking in through side entrance and through trainers room, with campus police at every entrance-it was really a sight to see."
"They were a group of guys that the whole community could get behind," Gehling recalled. "We could leave our political activism to the side and just be Tufts students cheering for the Tufts basketball team."
That unity wasn't limited to the team's fans; many members of the squad have remained close throughout the years, and several attended the induction ceremony.
"I've always felt that when you're part of a winning program, you take that further in life, and these guys have," Penders said. "When kids are on a team that's maybe not as successful, they don't have a reason to celebrate what they did. These guys had every reason to celebrate."
