MR. BASKETBALL Adolph Frederick Rupp
(21 YearsWon 442, Lost 7984.8%)
"The Man in The Brown Suit" sounds like the title for a good mystery thriller and might very well be if it were not for Adolph Rupp, University of Kentucky's affable wizard of hardwood magic.
Colorful as he is successful, Kentucky's head cage mentor long ago was tagged with the descriptive title by sportswriters of the nation because of his preference of brown as a game-night wardrobe and thus forestalled any cloak-and-dagger novelist from becoming famous with the title.
The nation's 1950 "Coach of the Year" and tutor of the 1951 NCAA cage champions is known to the basketball world by a variety of other titles, such as "Mr. Basketball," "Baron," "Colonel," "The Baron of Basketball," and "01' Rupp and Ready"but none adequately describes the human interest of the man who has done more than any other modern tutor to make the cage game a national spectator sport.
With his 21st year at the Bluegrass school behind him, Baron Rupp can look back over a two-decade regime of unparalleled successan amazing record of 442 wins against 79 losses plus a third NCAA Tournament championship for his Kentucky basketeers, representing the first team in history to annex the title three times.
The crafty professor of hardwood tactics and his nationally-famous Wildcats have become virtually synonymous in the basketball world. The record compiled by Rupp-coached Kentucky teams borders on the fantastic and his cage powerhouses have consistently won nationwide fame in intercollegiate competition.
Rupp's Kentucky Wildcats can boast an unequalled
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