A look back at 1969 - and the Miller era

Fifty years ago - in the early spring of 1969 - Jackie Cooper Ingle was a freshman at Eastern New Mexico University in Portales, an elementary education major from Kenna who happened to be an avid Greyhound basketball fan.

She was not alone.

"I remember the lines to get into the arena wrapped around the complex," she said. "The gym was packed; every seat was taken with standing room only. You didn't dare go get popcorn or you would lose your seat. The team and the games were in every conversation on campus and in town."

It was a team that on March 15, 1969, would capture the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics championship in Kansas City, Missouri, a first not only for ENMU but - according to news accounts - for any New Mexico college or university.

There were 3,524 students enrolled at ENMU that spring. The 5,000 seats in still-almost-new Greyhound Arena were the hottest tickets in the region.

"The gym was always packed - loud, fun, exciting," recalled Patricia Smith Thatcher of Portales. She was a junior that year. "We could hardly wait to get to the game and would not miss one for the world."

ENMU alum and former Greyhound basketball player Harry Miller coached that team. It was one of five seasons he held the head coaching job at his alma mater, a time Eastern still calls "the Miller era."

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Nearly two dozen men associated with the Miller era - many of them players on that 1969 team - are returning to campus this weekend for a reunion and 50th-anniversary celebration of the year the 'Hounds brought home the title.

Confirmed attendees, ENMU officials said, include:

John Arnold, Gary Coffman, Gary Giannoni, Jim Guymon, Charles Hyder, Jerry Hyder, John Irwin, Bill Joy, Gary Miller, Robert Miller, Tom Miller, Pete Norris, Rolland "Buddy" Othick, John Robertson, Dale Severson, Rick Schalk, Jerry Stephenson, Simon Terrazas, Jim Thrash, Larry Vanzant, and Jack Willis.

Greg Waggoner, Eastern's athletic director, said the public is invited to join the honorees at noon Saturday for lunch in the dining hall at ENMU's Campus Union Building. The $9.95 tickets may be purchased at the door.

Even more importantly, Waggoner is hoping that an arena-full of us will join the former champs and get into the 1960s spirit that afternoon as the current Greyhounds take on Western New Mexico University in two games beginning at 2 p.m.

"The theme for the game is 'Sixties,'" Waggoner said, "so we're encouraging people to dress in '60's style. We will have some '60's music playing periodically throughout the evening and a couple of 'name that tune' opportunities."

Tickets for the day will be "60s prices," he said, with general admission seats discounted to $5. ENMU students attend for free.

The Greyhound women take the court first; the men's game is expected to start about 4 p.m. The 1969 NAIA champions will be recognized during halftime of that second game.

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On March 14, 1969, in his "By the Way" column, Portales News-Tribune Editor Gordon Greaves wrote about the team that rocked Greyhound Arena a half century ago.

"Seldom has Portales been on a higher emotional jag than today, with the Greyhounds from Eastern going into the semi-finals of the NAIA tournament in Kansas City," Greaves wrote.

"The thing that has given the old home town such a charge of interest is that the members of the Greyhound team have been ambassadors of good will of the highest type," he said. "Their discipline, 'heart,' and obvious professional coaching has won the crowd at the big Kansas City Municipal Auditorium."

Coach Miller and his "Pack" captivated our whole area in the 1968-69 season, according to Jackie Ingle and others.

"They pulled people from everywhere," Ingle said. "The whole community was involved."

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It was the second week of March - mid-terms at Eastern - when the team left for Kansas City, ranked 12th out of the 32 qualifying teams. At least one report called them the "Cinderfellows" of the national tournament.

Five winning games later - on the evening of March 15, 1969 - they were presented with the first-place trophy.

A banner headline crossed the front page of the Portales News-Tribune the next morning announcing in bold-face, all capital letters, "GREYHOUNDS ARE NO. 1."

In the article below (with the memorable alliterative subtitle, "Portales' Pulse Pounds in Pride") the reporter noted, "The Greyhounds are the first New Mexico college team to reach the dizzy heights of a national championship playoff in as long as anyone can remember, and the 16,000 residents of Portales and Roosevelt County, plus three times that number in Clovis and Curry County are savoring every moment of the triumph."

The story said "several hundred Greyhound boosters" had made the trek to Kansas City, "including students on a financial shoestring that included plans to sleep in their cars, and live on hot dogs."

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Those who couldn't make the journey were glued to their radios.

"I listened to the game with a few other sorority sisters in my room at Harding Hall," Thatcher said. "There were moments during the game where I am certain we held our breath for several minutes."

Two of the Greyhounds - brothers Greg and Jerry Hyder - had family in their hometown of Victorville, California, who were unable to make the trip to Kansas City.

Lois Marie Dunn Coats, who now lives in Flower Mound, Texas, was an ENMU student from Portales then, and vividly remembers her mother, the late Anita Dunn, lending a hand from Portales.

"Mother called Mrs. Hyder and held the phone to our radio so she could hear the game," Coats said.

The Portales News-Tribune confirmed that in Victorville that evening, "the Hyder brothers' high school principal and coach and about 40 friends were on hand to listen to the Saturday night radio broadcast by long distance telephone relay."

Telephones also made it possible for Portales News-Tribune writer Ron Harris to file his stories each day. He traveled with the team to Kansas City. He wrote his accounts after each game, then spent almost an hour dictating them over a telephone to the newsroom in Portales.

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The national champion Greyhounds returned to the High Plains on a Sunday, March 16, 1969, on a TWA flight that landed in Amarillo. They were met that chilly afternoon on the New Mexico/Texas state line in Texico by a hastily assembled welcome-home caravan.

In his News-Tribune column, "Pack Talk," sportswriter Harris wrote, "There must have been hundreds of cars, alongside the highway, off on side roads ... everywhere. And in them, thousands of area residents with arms raised and index finger extended with the shout of 'NUMBER ONE' resounding everywhere.

"As the caravan rolled on people were everywhere ... youngsters, oldsters, people from Clovis, Portales, Texico, proud people raising the Number One sign," Harris wrote. "Big grins split everyone's face, people cried and shouted and waved and the Greyhounds pulled in to the Eastern Student Union parking lot with more than a few handkerchiefs to noses."

An Associated Press article said "some 1,000 students were waiting" at ENMU when the caravan arrived in Portales.

The next day - March 17 - was proclaimed by both Portales Mayor James Kiker and Clovis Mayor Chick Taylor as "Greyhound Day." New Mexico Gov. David Cargo proclaimed the days that followed as "Greyhound Week in New Mexico."

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"This team brought so much notoriety to ENMU, Portales, Roosevelt County, and the state," said Jackie Ingle. "Even after 50 years we are still celebrating this fabulous time in our history and celebrating those that made it happen. This team was special."

And now many of them are on their way back to the High Plains.

Saturday afternoon. Greyhound Arena. Let's be there to welcome them home.

Betty Williamson is dusting off her pompoms. Reach her at:

[email protected]