Back to One City: The 1973 Memphis State Tigers and Myths of Race and Sport

Authors

Aram Goudsouzian, University of Memphis

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Description

In 1973, the then-Memphis State (now University of Memphis) Tigers’ Men's Basketball team reached the NCAA tournament final. In the history of college basketball, Memphis State’s season is just a footnote, as the Tigers lost the title game to UCLA, which captured its seventh consecutive NCAA championship. But in Memphis, this team became a civic mythic legend. With each victory, the city’s enthusiasm ballooned, inspiring more paeans to players Larry Finch and Ronnie Robinson, coach Gene Bartow, and budding superstar Larry Kenon. Politicians and journalists upheld the team as a vehicle of interracial unity, healing the scars of the 1968 Sanitation Strike and Martin Luther King’s assassination. As with many myths, this one has elements of truth yet it hides as much as it reveals.

Publication Date

3-31-2016

Relational Format

journal article

Recommended Citation

Goudsouzian, Aram, "Back to One City: The 1973 Memphis State Tigers and Myths of Race and Sport" (2016). Study the South. 18.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/studythesouth/18

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