March 27, 1939: The 1st NCAA Basketball Tournament Final

March 27, 1939: The National Collegiate Athletic Association holds the Final of its 1st men's basketball tournament, at the original Patten Gymnasium on the campus of Northwestern University, in the Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois.

Only 8 teams were invited to the 1st NCAA Tournament, 2 independents and 6 Conference Champions. The East Regional was played at The Palestra on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania. Villanova, an independent from just outside Philadelphia, beat the other independent, now in the Ivy League, Brown University of Providence, Rhode Island, 42-30. Big Ten Champion Ohio State beat Southern Conference Champion Wake Forest, 64-52. And Ohio State beat Villanova, 53-36, to advance to the Final.

The West Regional was played at the California Coliseum in San Francisco. Oregon, Champions of the Pacific Coast Conference, beat Texas, Champions of the Southwest Conference, 56-41. Oklahoma, Champions of the Big Six (forerunner of the Big Eight and Big Twelve), beat Utah State, Champions of the Mountain States Conference, 50-39. And Oregon beat Oklahoma, 55-37.

Oregon's teams were known as the Webfoots, and, originally, it had nothing to do with ducks. The name originally applied to a group of fishermen from the coast of Massachusetts who had been heroes during the War of the American Revolution. Their descendants had settled in Oregon's Willamette Valley in the 19th Century, and the name stayed with them. Having used the name since the dawn of their athletic program in the 1890s, the University of Oregon made it official in 1926. Eventually, "Webfoots" became associated with ducks, but the switch to "Ducks" was not made official until 1978, and "Webfoots" is still sometimes used, out of sentiment.

Coached by Howard Hobson, the '39 Webfoots were known as the "Tall Firs," comparing them to trees that grew in the State. They did usually have a height advantage: Center Urgel "Slim" Wintermute was 6-foot-8, and forwards Lauren "Laddie" Gale and John Dick were 6-foot-4. Wintermute was from Longview, Washington. Also from Washington State were guards Ford Mullen from Olympia and Matt Pavalunas from Raymond. The other 8 players were from Oregon.

Patten Gym seated about 9,000 people, and contemporary reports suggest that it was only half-full. (History would repeat itself with the 1st Super Bowl: That game only saw about 2/3rds of its available seats bought.) But one of the people in attendance was Dr. James Naismith, who invented basketball 48 years earlier, and later served as head coach at the University of Kansas, and would die later in the year, at age 78.

Patten Gym

Guard Robert Anet, the Oregon Captain, scored the 1st basket, after rebounding a missed shot. Oregon scored the 1st 6 points of the game, before Ohio State closed to within 12-11, but Oregon regained the momentum to lead 21-16 at the half.

Early in the 2nd half, Ohio State closed to within 21-20. But Oregon jumped out to a 40-29 lead, and, with no shot clock, started stalling, keeping the ball away from Ohio State. At one point, Anet chased a loose ball toward the scorer's table, where the trophy was being kept. He knocked the trophy off the table, breaking the little brass basketball player off the top of it. When the game ended, 46-33 in Oregon's favor, Anet, as Captain, was handed the two pieces of the trophy.

Howard Hobson was among the honorees in Kansas City in 1988, when the NCAA celebrated the 50th Final Four. He lived until 1991. Ford Mullen was the last survivor of the 1939 Oregon team, living until 2013. We think: It's possible, but highly unlikely, that one other lived longer. In 1977, Slim Wintermute, by then an executive with Boeing, took a friend aboard his yacht on Lake Union in Seattle. When the yacht didn't return, a search party found it, and found the friend, asleep in his bunk on board, but not Wintermute. The friend said Wintermute was alive and well when he went to sleep. Wintermute's remains have never been found. He was already 60 years old, so, even if he did survive, he is unlikely to still be alive.

At the time, no one knew that the NCAA Tournament would grow into a 68-team "March Madness," culminating in a "Final Four," that would obsess a big chunk of the country. Still, it is a little jarring to know that the site of the 1st Final Four was soon gone: Patten Gym, at 2145 Sheridan Road, was torn down in 1940, and Northwestern's Technological Institute was built on the site.

The current Patten Gym opened immediately thereafter, 3 blocks to the north, at Sheridan Road and Lincoln Street. It was the home of Northwestern basketball until 1952, when Welsh-Ryan Arena opened a mile to the northwest, at 2705 Ashland Avenue, in the north end zone of Ryan Field (formerly Dyche Stadium).

In spite of this initial success, Oregon wouldn't reach the Final Four again until 2017. In contrast, Ohio State have made the Final Four 10 more times, most recently in 2012, including the 1960 National Championship.

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March 27, 1939 was a Monday. Baseball was in Spring Training. Football was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. And this was an off-day in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. So there were no other scores on this historic day.

January 12, 2015: The 1st College Football National Championship Playoff

January 12, 2015: For the 1st time, the College Football National Championship Playoff is concluded, deciding a definitive National Champion.

Under the old system, the Champions of the Big Ten Conference and the league now known as the Pacific-Twelve Conference would have played in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. But now, these are the teams that will play for the National Championship, not in the Rose Bowl game, but in a specifically-designed game.

Nor would it be held in the Rose Bowl stadium. Rather, it was held at AT&T Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas, home of the Dallas Cowboys, and by this point also the home of the Cotton Bowl Classic, even though the old Cotton Bowl stadium still stood (and still does).

The University of Oregon began the 2014 college football season by clobbering Football Championship Series (FCS, formerly Division I-AA) South Dakota, at home at Autzen Stadium in Eugene, Oregon. But they caught attention the next week by beating then-Number 7 Michigan State, 46-27. They pounded Wyoming, and won a shootout with Washington State. Then, they stumbled, losing 31-24 to Arizona at home.

But they picked themselves up. They did play in the Rose Bowl stadium that season, because that's also UCLA's home field. UCLA were ranked Number 18, but Oregon beat them, 42-30. They beat Washington 45-20, they beat California away 59-41, they beat Stanford 45-16, they beat Number 17 Utah away 51-27, they beat Colorado 44-10, and concluded their regular season by beating their arch-rivals, Oregon State, 47-19 in Corvallis.

That got the Number 2 Ducks into the Pac-12 Championship Game, against Number 8 Arizona. At Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, home of the San Francisco 49ers, they avenged their only loss, laying a 51-13 licking on the Wildcats.

So Oregon were in the 1st-ever College Football National Championship Playoff. And they were, as it turned out, in the Rose Bowl game, which served as one of the Semifinals. They were the 2nd seed, against Number 2 but 3rd-seeded Florida State. And the Ducks left no doubt as to which of these teams was the better: They beat the Seminoles 59-20. They were in the Final.

This was a team that had games in which they scored 62, 59 twice, 51 twice, 48, 47, 46, 45 twice, 44, 42 and 38. What team could hold this juggernaut back?

The team at the Ohio State University was ready, willing and able to try. They began the season in Baltimore, beating Navy. Then they lost at home at Ohio Stadium, to Virginia Tech, 35-21. That drooped them to Number 22 in the national rankings, and seemed to knock them out of National Championship contention. And home wins over Kent State, the University of Cincinnati and Rutgers, and a win away to Maryland, did little to raise their profile.

Then, in a nationally-televised prime-time game at Beaver Stadium in State College, Pennsylvania, the Buckeyes beat Penn State, 31-24 in 2 overtimes. That inspired them. They were back up to Number 13. They pounded Illinois, 55-14. They went to Michigan State, then ranked Number 7, and beat them, 49-37. Now, they were looking like a title contender again.

They beat Minnesota away, Indiana at home, and won "The Game," beating Michigan, 42-28. That raised them to Number 5, and put them in the Big Ten Championship Game, where they slaughtered Number 11 Wisconsin, 59-0. That put them in the Playoff, as the 4th seed, against 1st seed Alabama. The Semifinal was the Sugar Bowl, at the Superdome in New Orleans, with 2 legendary programs going at it, hammer-and-tongs. And Ohio State emerged victorious, 42-35.

So, while coach Mark Helfrich's Oregon were capable of putting a hellacious number on the scoreboard, so were Urban Meyer's Ohio State: They'd already done 66, 59, 56, 55, 52, 50, 49, and 42 three times. The Final of the 1st NCAA Tournament in basketball, in 1939, featured these same schools, and Oregon won that, 46-33. I don't know if anyone thought it was appropriate that the same schools were playing in this 1st official National Championship Playoff, but it certainly wouldn't have surprised many people if this game were to end with a higher score.

Oregon struck first. Their quarterback, Marcus Mariota, had won the Heisman Trophy. He threw a 7-yard touchdown pass to Keanon Lowe. Ohio State needed to convert a 4th & 3 to keep a drive going, and did. The drive continued, and ended with Ezekiel Elliott running 33 yards for a touchdown. A dumb pass interference penalty by Oregon set the Buckeyes up again, and Cardale Jones threw to Nick Vanett to give them a 14-7 lead at the end of the 1st quarter.

Oregon marched deep into Ohio State territory, but on 4th & goal at the 3, instead of trying a field goal, Helfrich decided to go for 6, and the Ducks were stopped. The Buckeyes took over, and went most of the way down the field, but fumbled at the Oregon 11. The Ducks had to punt on the next possession anyway, and the Buckeyes took advantage, Jones scoring on a quarterback sneak to make it 21-10 Ohio State at the half.

The Buckeyes started the 2nd half by moving into Oregon territory, but Jones threw an interception. On the next play, Mariota threw to Byron Marshall, who took it in 70 yards for a touchdown. The Ducks were back in the ballgame. At 6:39 of the 3rd, Oregon kicked a field goal to make it 21-20.

That was as close as the Ducks would get. Ohio State took the ball back, moved 75 yards, and Elliott ran 9 yards for a touchdown. Early in the 4th quarter, Elliott scored another. With less than 3 minutes to go, he scored a 4th touchdown. Ohio State won, 42-20.

The original system, relying on the bowls, left undefeated teams stuck at Number 2, sometimes even Number 3, claiming to be better than the team that was ranked Number 1 in the final polls. The replacement system, the Bowl Championship Series, was supposed to fix this, but if the Number 3 team looked better than the Number 2, or even the Number 1, and didn't get a chance to prove it, then the system wasn't really better. Now, 4 teams had a chance, and, on this 1st occasion, it was the 4th seed that proved themselves to be the best team in the country.

The Playoff system isn't perfect. As with the BCS and its top 2, there is a chance that 1 of the top 4 teams in the last poll before the Playoff puts in a team that didn't win its Conference, or even its Division.

In 2017, Alabama lost the Southeastern Conference Championship Game to Georgia, but got into the 2018 Playoff, and beat Georgia in the Final. In the 2021 season that just ended, this result was reversed: Alabama beat Georgia in the SEC title game, but Georgia got into the Playoff, and beat 'Bama for the National Championship.

So no system is perfect.

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January 12, 2015 was a Thursday. Baseball was out of season. The NFL was in the middle of its Playoffs. There were 4 games played in the NBA that night:

* The Brooklyn Nets lost to the Houston Rockets, 113-99 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

* The Boston Celtics beat the New Orleans Pelicans, 108-100 at the TD Garden in Boston.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Toronto Raptors, 114-111 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.

* And the Orlando Magic beat the Chicago Bulls, 121-114 at the United Center in Chicago.

And there were 3 games played in the NHL:

* The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Tampa Bay Lightning, 7-3 at the Wells Fargo Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Columbus Blue Jackets, 2-1 at the Verizon Center (now the Capital One Arena) in Washington.

* And the Los Angeles Kings beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 2-0 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles.