Shocker Coaches - Career Victories

[Kung Wu]

Also, for those who don't know, Unmus brought the Wheatshockers their first All American, and Johnson brought the Wheatshockers their first Olympians. A few lines from Hoopedia:

...
Coach Gene Johnson took over in 1928 and led the Shockers to five straight winning records and won 75.5 percent of his games. He helped coach the 1936 U.S. Olympic team to a gold medal in Berlin, a team that featured Shockers Francis Johnson (Gene's brother) and Jack Ragland.

There should be a banner for McBurney.

So Joe Ragland WASN'T the original JRags afterall? Who knew?

[wufan]

Most of the 36 Olympic Team was from Kansas, McPherson specifically. A tradition that is strong in this community to this day (I'm a transplant from Wichita)!

Also, there are a lot of 6-8+ dudes in this town that are in their 80s. Many of them are offspring of the olympic team or AAU National Champions.

[GarH]

Great thread!! One of the best I've read in awhile.

[ripemupshocks]

Most of the 36 Olympic Team was from Kansas, McPherson specifically. A tradition that is strong in this community to this day (I'm a transplant from Wichita)!

Also, there are a lot of 6-8+ dudes in this town that are in their 80s. Many of them are offspring of the olympic team or AAU National Champions.

Not to qiubble, but most of the 36 Olympic team was not from Kansas. The Universal Pictures AAU team beat the Globe Refiners 44-43 for the AAU National Championship. So according to the book, The Golden Age of Amateur Basketball - The AAU Tournament 1921-1968, the Olympic Basketball Committee awarded Universal Pictures head coach Jimmy Needles the head coaching position on the 36 Olympic team. And the second place Globe Refiners head coach, Gene Johnson, was awarded the position of assistant coach. As head coach, Jimmy Needles was allowed to pick the majority of the 14 member Olympic team. Eight members were selected from the Universal team, and the other six came from the Globe Refiners team. The make-up of the Olympic team was as follows:

From The Universal AAU Team;

Duane Swanson (USC)
Donald Piper (UCLA)
Sam Balter (UCLA)
Carl Knowles (UCLA)
Ralph Bishop (University of Washington)
Art Mollner (Los Angeles Junior College)
Frank Lubin (UCLA)
Carl Shy (UCLA)


From the Globe Refiners AAU Team:

Francis Johnson, Captain, b. Hartford KS - d. Chesterfield MO, (Wichita University)
Jack Ragland, b. Hutchinson KS - d. Tucson AZ, (Wichita University)
Bill Wheatley, b. Gypsum KS - d. El Cerrito CA, (Never played college basketball)
Tex Gibbons, b. Elk City OK - d. La Habra CA, (Southwestern College)
Joe Fortenberry, b. Slidell TX - d. Amarillo TX, (West Texas State)
Willard Schmidt, b. Swanton NE - d. Coffeyville KS, (Creighton University)

As was common in the day, most of these guys only played for the Globe Refiners for a season or two before moving on to other teams or occupations.

[wufan]

Not to qiubble, but most of the 36 Olympic team was not from Kansas. The Universal Pictures AAU team beat the Globe Refiners 44-43 for the AAU National Championship. So according to the book, The Golden Age of Amateur Basketball - The AAU Tournament 1921-1968, the Olympic Basketball Committee awarded Universal Pictures head coach Jimmy Needles the head coaching position on the 36 Olympic team. And the second place Globe Refiners head coach, Gene Johnson, was awarded the position of assistant coach. As head coach, Jimmy Needles was allowed to pick the majority of the 14 member Olympic team. Eight members were selected from the Universal team, and the other six came from the Globe Refiners team. The make-up of the Olympic team was as follows:

From The Universal AAU Team;

Duane Swanson (USC)
Donald Piper (UCLA)
Sam Balter (UCLA)
Carl Knowles (UCLA)
Ralph Bishop (University of Washington)
Art Mollner (Los Angeles Junior College)
Frank Lubin (UCLA)
Carl Shy (UCLA)


From the Globe Refiners AAU Team:

Francis Johnson, Captain, b. Hartford KS - d. Chesterfield MO, (Wichita University)
Jack Ragland, b. Hutchinson KS - d. Tucson AZ, (Wichita University)
Bill Wheatley, b. Gypsum KS - d. El Cerrito CA, (Never played college basketball)
Tex Gibbons, b. Elk City OK - d. La Habra CA, (Southwestern College)
Joe Fortenberry, b. Slidell TX - d. Amarillo TX, (West Texas State)
Willard Schmidt, b. Swanton NE - d. Coffeyville KS, (Creighton University)

As was common in the day, most of these guys only played for the Globe Refiners for a season or two before moving on to other teams or occupations.

They lived in and worked in McPherson in 1936 and local lore is that some stuck around. I'm sure others (not on the olympic team) raised families here as well.

Per the local memorial:

"Because international rules limited the team to seven players, the U.S. team was divided into a Globe Refiners unit and a Hollywood Universal unit.The Globe Refiners unit ended up playing the championship game, defeating Canada for the first-ever Olympic Gold Medal in basketball."

[Rlh04d]

Speaking of all this historical stuff, some people from here should try to flush out the basketball team's history on Wikipedia. There's a lot that could be added to it from knowledgeable folks.

I added a lot to the page a few weeks back, but I didn't mess with most of the historical narrative sections.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wichita_state_men's_basketball

[ripemupshocks]

Most of the 36 Olympic Team was from Kansas, McPherson specifically. A tradition that is strong in this community to this day (I'm a transplant from Wichita)!

Also, there are a lot of 6-8+ dudes in this town that are in their 80s. Many of them are offspring of the olympic team or AAU National Champions.

Not to qiubble, but most of the 36 Olympic team was not from Kansas. The Universal Pictures AAU team beat the Globe Refiners 44-43 for the AAU National Championship. So according to the book, The Golden Age of Amateur Basketball - The AAU Tournament 1921-1968, the Olympic Basketball Committee awarded Universal Pictures head coach Jimmy Needles the head coaching position on the 36 Olympic team. And the second place Globe Refiners head coach, Gene Johnson, was awarded the position of assistant coach. As head coach, Jimmy Needles was allowed to pick the majority of the 14 member Olympic team. Eight members were selected from the Universal team, and the other six came from the Globe Refiners team. The make-up of the Olympic team was as follows:

From The Universal AAU Team;

Duane Swanson (USC)
Donald Piper (UCLA)
Sam Balter (UCLA)
Carl Knowles (UCLA)
Ralph Bishop (University of Washington)
Art Mollner (Los Angeles Junior College)
Frank Lubin (UCLA)
Carl Shy (UCLA)


From the Globe Refiners AAU Team:

Francis Johnson, Captain, b. Hartford KS - d. Chesterfield MO, (Wichita University)
Jack Ragland, b. Hutchinson KS - d. Tucson AZ, (Wichita University)
Bill Wheatley, b. Gypsum KS - d. El Cerrito CA, (Never played college basketball)
Tex Gibbons, b. Elk City OK - d. La Habra CA, (Southwestern College)
Joe Fortenberry, b. Slidell TX - d. Amarillo TX, (West Texas State)
Willard Schmidt, b. Swanton NE - d. Coffeyville KS, (Creighton University)

As was common in the day, most of these guys only played for the Globe Refiners for a season or two before moving on to other teams or occupations.

They lived in and worked in McPherson in 1936 and local lore is that some stuck around. I'm sure others (not on the olympic team) raised families here as well.

Per the local memorial:

"Because international rules limited the team to seven players, the U.S. team was divided into a Globe Refiners unit and a Hollywood Universal unit.The Globe Refiners unit ended up playing the championship game, defeating Canada for the first-ever Olympic Gold Medal in basketball."

I stand corrected on two points.

1. The 44-43 game I referred to above as the AAU Championship game, was not. The AAU Chanpionship game between the Universal team and the Globe team actually occured two weeks earlier in Denver, and was won by the Globe team. The 44-43 game was the final of the USA Olympic trials in New York.
2.Ralph Bishop (University of Washington) was not a member of the Universal AAU team and was not chosen for the Olympic team by Universal coach Jimmy Needles. He was actually chosen for the Olympic team by the USA Olympic committee.

It is true that the rules limited teams to seven players per game. But according to the same book I referenced above, keeping the players divided based on AAU teams and alternating games was the players idea. Coach Needles had none of it. He chose instead to integrate the players from the two AAU teams. In fact in an interview given by Sam Balter years later, he talked about the differing styles of the two squads, he referred to Universal as the "sure passers" and Globe as the "wildmen". Balter stated that coach's Needles and Johnson believed the best course for success was to combine the two different types of players and systems into one team.

Here you can find the box scores from the 1936 games.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/olympics/teams/USA/1936

As you can see, of the four games, the only one to exclude any players from one or the other of the two AAU team was the semi-final against Mexico. That squad was comprised of six Universal players plus Ralph Bishop. The squads for the other three games were made up of a combination of players from both AAU teams.

I know I'm way off topic here. And I'm not trying to stir the sh*t. Just trying to pass along a few facts.

[wusphlash]

As of 10/17/2014

Coach	Wins	Seasons	Shocker Wins	Seasons	Avg Wins Per Season Career	Win % Career	Average Wins Per Year @ WSU	Win % @ WSU
Gregg Marshall	368	16	174	7	23	0.705	24.8	0.710
Mark Turgeon	309	16	128	7	19.3	0.605	18.3	0.587
Randy Smithson	55	4	55	4	13.8	0.470	13.8	0.470
Scott Thompson	150	13	40	4	11.5	0.418	10.0	0.364
Mike Cohen	32	3	32	3	10.7	0.364	10.7	0.364
Eddie Fogler	265	15	61	3	17.7	0.574	20.3	0.656
Gene Smithson	221	11	155	8	20.1	0.691	19.4	0.657
Harry Miller	233	17	97	7	13.7	0.500	13.9	0.519
Gary Thompson	93	7	93	7	13.3	0.497	13.3	0.497
Ralph Miller	657	38	220	13	17.3	0.632	16.9	0.623

[60Shock]

Not to take a single thing away from Greg. He is tremendous in all categories and certainly deserves to labled one of, if not the greatest coach we have ever had.

But keep in mind that during Ralph Miller's time here, the MVC arguably was one of, if not the best BB conference in the land. Just being in the top third of the conference was a tremendous achievement and only the top team got an NCAA invite. Plus, Valley teams frequently ruled the NIT which was considered quite significant to get an invite to and a very special accomplisment to win it.

Plus, our out of conference schdule back in the mid 1950 -1980 period was much, much stronger than it has been even considering this year's schedule. On the other hand, three consecutive NCAA bids with one being Final 4, an NIT Championship, and winning 35 consecutive games in a row, are remarkable feats as well.

Just saying, exam all the facts when comparing wins and percentages between decades.

[wufan]

Also, about 4 fewer games per year pre-1990.

[Shocker-maniac]

Not to take a single thing away from Greg. He is tremendous in all categories and certainly deserves to labled one of, if not the greatest coach we have ever had.

But keep in mind that during Ralph Miller's time here, the MVC arguably was one of, if not the best BB conference in the land. Just being in the top third of the conference was a tremendous achievement and only the top team got an NCAA invite. Plus, Valley teams frequently ruled the NIT which was considered quite significant to get an invite to and a very special accomplisment to win it.

Plus, our out of conference schdule back in the mid 1950 -1980 period was much, much stronger than it has been even considering this year's schedule. On the other hand, three consecutive NCAA bids with one being Final 4, an NIT Championship, and winning 35 consecutive games in a row, are remarkable feats as well.

Just saying, exam all the facts when comparing wins and percentages between decades.

No argument from me. Both are tremendous coaches for their eras. Nothing but respect for both coaches.

[MadaboutWu]

I would never have guessed that Fogler for all intents and purposes shares the second best win percentage with Smithson (and shared the first before last year).

[ShockTalk]

I would never have guessed that Fogler for all intents and purposes shares the second best win percentage with Smithson (and shared the first before last year).

And Fast Eddie can thank Gene for recruiting most of his successful players, particularly his first 2 of 3 years.

[ripemupshocks]

I believe Coach Marshalls' win % @ WSU is actually .710.

What about Wilmer Elfrink, 16-2 (.888); Leonard Umnus, 47-14 (.770); Gene Johnson, 75-24 (.757).

[wusphlash]

I believe Coach Marshalls' win % @ WSU is actually .710.

What about Wilmer Elfrink, 16-2 (.888); Leonard Umnus, 47-14 (.770); Gene Johnson, 75-24 (.757).

You are correct. .710 is the correct number. The .665 was last years number. The table has been fixed.