1963-64

UCLA made its first trip to the Final Four in 1962 and finished fourth. Two years later, the Bruins returned and won it all. Little did anyone know that John Wooden & Co. would win 9 more titles in the next 11 years.

Led by the backcourt of Walt Hazard and Gail Goodrich, UCLA was undefeated during the regular season and entered the NCAAs ranked No.1. At the Final Four in Kansas City, the Bruins beat local favorite Kansas State in the semifinals, snapping the Wildcats' 13–game win streak in the process. No.3 Duke beat No.2 Michigan in the other semifinal.

In the championship game, UCLA—with no players over 6-5—beat the taller and slower Blue Devils by 15 to give coach Wooden his first championship.

Unranked Bradley won the NIT for the third time in eight years, routing No.14 New Mexico by 32 in the final.

Seven players averaged better than 30 points a game in 1964, led by Bowling Green's Howie Komives, who averaged 36.7.

Final AP Top 10 (Writers' poll taken before major tournaments. From 1962–63 through 1967–68, AP ranked only 10 teams).

Note: UCLA won the NCAAs.

Second 10 (Taken from final UPI coaches' poll).

Note: Unranked Bradley (20–6, Chuck Orsborn, 23–6) won the NIT.

Consensus All-America (By position, in alphabetical order)

  First Team

·         Gary Bradds, Ohio St.

·         Bill Bradley, Princeton

·         Walt Hazzard, UCLA

·         Cotton Nash, Kentucky

·         Dave Stallworth, Wichita St.

  Second Team

·         Ron Bonham, Cincinnati

·         Mel Counts, Oregon St.

·         Fred Hetzel, Davidson

·         Jeff Mullins, Duke

AP POLL

1. UCLA
2. Michigan
3. Duke
4. Kentucky
5. Wichita State
6. Oregon State
7. Villanova
8. Loyola-Chicago
9. DePaul
10. Davidson

UPI COACHES POLL

1. UCLA
2. Michigan
3. Kentucky
4. Duke
5. Oregon State
6. Wichita State
7. Villanova
8. Loyola-Chicago
9. Texas-El Paso
10. Davidson

NCAA Results

First Round
Villanova 77, Providence 66
Connecticut 53, Temple 48
Princeton 86, Virginia Military 60
Ohio University 71, Louisville 69 (OT)
Loyola (Ill.) 101, Murray State 91
Creighton 89, Oklahoma City 78
Texas Western 68, Texas A&M 62
Seattle 61, Oregon State 57
Utah State 92, Arizona State 90
Regional Semifinals
Duke 87, Villanova 73
Connecticut 52, Princeton 50
Ohio University 85, Kentucky 69
Michigan 84, Loyola (Ill.) 80
Wichita State 84, Creighton 68
Kansas State 64, Texas Western 60
UCLA 95, Seattle 90
San Francisco 64, Utah State 58
Regional Third Place
East: Villanova 74, Princeton 62
Mideast: Loyola (Ill.) 100, Kentucky 91
Midwest: Texas Western 63, Creighton 52
West: Seattle 88, Utah State 78
Regional Finals
East: Duke 101, Connecticut 54
Mideast: Michigan 69, Ohio University 57
Midwest: Kansas State 94, Wichita State 86
West: UCLA 76, San Francisco 72
National Semifinals
Duke 91, Michigan 80
UCLA 90, Kansas State 84
National Third Place
Michigan 100, Kansas State 90
Championship Game
UCLA 98, Duke 83


UCLA leaders: G Gail Goodrich, Jr.; G Walt Hazzard, Sr.; F Jack Hirsch, Sr.; F Keith Erickson, Jr.; C Fred Slaughter, Sr.

All-NCAA Tournament Team

Top 10

All-America Team

Leaders
Team
Offense: Detroit, 96.1
Defense: San Jose State, 54.5

Individual Scoring

Rebounding

Notes

• This was the first of UCLA’s 10 NCAA titles in 12 years.

• Bradley trounced New Mexico 86-54 to win NIT crown. The Braves shot 62 percent from the floor.

• Butch Komives hit 50 consecutive free throws in his last five games, winning the scoring title.

• Western Kentucky coach Ed Diddle retired after 42 years, finishing with a 759-302 record (an average season of 18-7).

HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES

1964
*John W. Bunn, Contributor
*Harold E. Foster, Player
*Nat Holman, Player
*Edward S. Irish, Contributor
*R. William Jones, Contributor
*Kenneth D. Loeffler, Coach
*John D. Russell, Player

The rise of UCLA

It was a high school defense, one John Wooden had used successfully at South Bend (Ind.) Central in the years before World War II. It was designed to chop an opponent down to size, to counteract superior height and strength with quickness and agility. It was the weapon that would lift UCLA to basketball pre-eminence.

 

Walt Hazzard

For the longest time, Wooden didn't think the defense would stand up to major-college competition. It wasn't until the 1964 season, when he found himself with a 6-foot-5 center and some mischievous elves, that he dared to experiment with it.

Before long, Wooden was convinced that the 2-2-1 zone press was not only viable but a natural extension of the Bruins' available talent.

He had two superb guards in consensus All-American Walt Hazzard, a creative passer, and Gail Goodrich, a marvelous shooter. The undersized center, Fred Slaughter, had been a track star in high school. Jack Hirsch, a 6-3 forward, was a skilled defender. And the key man, 6-5 Keith Erickson, was a volleyball player of Olympic stature.

Erickson made it all work. He was the ideal safety man, an astonishing leaper and graceful runner who was unsurpassed at picking off the long passes that the point men invariably forced with their aggressive traps.

"When we do it properly," Wooden said, "our press sets a tempo for the whole game, and when we get the other team falling into our tempo, we have gained a big advantage."

Bolstered by two sophomores -- Kenny Washington and Doug McIntosh, who were adept at coming off the bench -- UCLA became an unstoppable whirlwind. The Bruins suggested what was to come in December when they routed Michigan, a preseason powerhouse, in the Los Angeles Classic by the stunning score of 98-80.

For the first time since Wooden, a schoolboy and college legend in Indiana, arrived on the West Coast, UCLA gained national recognition.

What frustrated opponents, especially burly ones like Michigan, was the team's apparent fragility. The guards did the majority of the scoring, and the press could be ineffective for long stretches. But when it ensnared a team, the effect was so sudden and startling that the outcome could be determined in about two minutes.

It had the impact of an explosion.

The Bruins believed in the zone press because it never had failed them. They qualified for the Final Four with their 27th and 28th victories of the season over Seattle and San Francisco in the West Regional. They arrived in Kansas City as the only undefeated team in the country.

Still, there were at least two reasons to believe UCLA would not join the 1956 San Francisco Dons and the 1957 North Carolina Tar Heels as the only unbeaten champions in NCAA Tournament history. Those reasons were Michigan and Duke, the second- and third-ranked schools in the nation. Michigan, the Big Ten Conference co-champion with Ohio State, was uncommonly strong and Duke, pride of the Atlantic Coast Conference, was uncommonly tall.

Duke's supporters said the Blue Devils had improved tremendously since being ravaged by Michigan early in the season, just as Michigan's boosters said the Wolverines had experienced an uncharacteristically bad night against UCLA.

In UCLA's favor was a schedule that pitted Duke against Michigan in one game while the Bruins tangled with surprising semifinalist Kansas State. As a result, UCLA would be required to beat only one of the bigger teams in order to win its first NCAA title. That was fine with Wooden.

"I have been asked," the coach said, "whether I'd like taller boys. Goodness gracious sakes alive!"

The latter was about as strong an expression as Wooden allowed himself in public. He didn't drink, didn't smoke and didn't believe in appealing to his players' emotions. As far as Westerners could ascertain, his only vices in life were the fast break and the zone press.

Besides, Wooden didn't really recruit these people -- at least not in the contemporary sense. Hazzard had starred at Wilt Chamberlain's old high school in Philadelphia but came to UCLA via a junior college in Southern California. Erickson, another junior college recruit, was more skilled at swatting volleyballs than basketballs when he became a Bruin.

Hirsch's father implored him to attend UCLA. Goodrich was a high school runt in whom no other major programs expressed interest until the end of his senior season. Washington was a shy youngster from South Carolina who was recommended to Wooden by Hazzard, against whom he had played on a Philadelphia playground one summer. Hazzard, however, told the coach Washington was 6-5 and weighed 230 pounds.

"Bless his heart," said Washington, who turned up in Westwood a lot closer to 6-3 and 175 pounds. "He didn't have to do it."

Of the first seven players, only Slaughter had been a blue-chip recruit. And his role was limited mostly to screening and rebounding because not even UCLA was about to entrust its offense to a 6-5 center. The Bruins placed Slaughter in a high post, enabling the smaller men to exploit their quickness by driving the lane and the baseline.

What pushed UCLA seemingly beyond its physical limitations were its teamwork and poise. The teamwork was the result of efficient and taxing practices in an old, stuffy gymnasium on the Westwood campus. (The Bruins played their home games several miles away at the Los Angeles Sports Arena.)

The poise probably was a reflection of the coach, who actually watched games from a seated position, his legs crossed and a rolled-up program in his hand. Although Wooden had a reputation for quietly flaying officials, he resembled a stern headmaster observing his students at play.

Wooden prepared his players well for a game and disliked calling timeouts to remind them of what they already should have known.

Both the teamwork and the poise were evident at Municipal Auditorium, where the Bruins, three-point victors over Kansas State during the regular season, trailed the Wildcats, 75-70, with 7:28 remaining in the game that would decide the Western title. Suddenly, it happened.

Just about the time that four Bruins cheerleaders arrived at the game -- their plane had been delayed by bad weather -- UCLA reversed the game's momentum. The Bruins scored 11 consecutive points in less than three minutes and hung on for a 90-84 victory. Erickson led UCLA with 28 points.

"Lately," Wooden said, "we have not been going well, but somehow we keep our poise and get out of the jams we get ourselves into. Now we have to do it one more time."

They would have to do it against Duke, which played a marvelous game against Michigan. The Blue Devils' two 6-10 frontcourt players, Jay Buckley and Hack Tison, held their own against the intimidating Bill Buntin and Oliver Darden.

In addition, the backcourt shot well and star forward Jeff Mullins provided a sure hand, all of which contributed to Duke's 91-80 victory. Only 31 points by sophomore sensation Cazzie Russell, who was playing on a swollen ankle, kept the Wolverines in contention.

The big question concerning Duke was its ability to handle the press. The early notices from the championship game were good. The Blue Devils were able to pass over it and take advantage of the mismatches downcourt often enough to assume a 30-27 lead with 7:14 left in the first half. And then, in a breathtaking two minutes and 34 seconds, their challenge was over. UCLA ran off 16 unanswered points for a 43-30 margin and never again was threatened.

Goodrich, finding his touch for the first time in the tournament, led the Bruins with 27 points in the 98-83 triumph. Hazzard scored only 11 points and fouled out with more than six minutes to play, but his superb floor leadership earned him the outstanding-player award.

At least as significant was the work of the two sophomore reserves. The lithe Washington, who had taken a 2,400-mile bus ride to California to play for UCLA, sight unseen, relieved the foul-plagued Erickson in the first half. He took 16 shots from the field, hit 11 and finished with 26 points and a team-high 12 rebounds. McIntosh, filling in for Slaughter, had eight points and 11 rebounds.

Despite its considerable size advantage, Duke was outrebounded, 43-35. And the press harassed the Blue Devils into 29 turnovers. There wasn't much doubt about UCLA's quality. The little team from the West Coast could play.

The Bruins were 30-0. They were college basketball's finest. They were champions.

"I am immensely proud of you," Wooden told his players. "You're really the best. You've proved it. Now don't let it change you. You are champions and you must act like champions. You met some people going up to the top. You will meet the same people going down."

In 1964, not even John Wooden could imagine how long UCLA would remain at or near the top.