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Sumner: Cameron Ended Hoops Career On High Note
1/20/2006 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
By Jim Sumner, Blue Devil Weekly
DURHAM, N.C. - Eddie Cameron was the first great basketball coach in Duke history. He took over the basketball position in 1928-29 and his teams won 226 games over 14 seasons. His 1942 team was his best ? a deep, balanced, athletic bunch that mowed through the opposition while running up one of the best records in Duke history.
Duke didn't look that imposing on paper. The 1941 team struggled to a mediocre 11-8 regular-season record before getting hot and winning the Southern Conference Tournament. Duke lost Chuck Holley, Cy Valasek, Glenn Price and several other key players from that team. The 1942 team returned only three lettermen from the previous season, forwards Ray “Hap” Spuhler and Sam Rothbaum, and guard Bill McCahan. Center Chuck Allen lettered in 1940 but sat out the 1941 season with a wrist injury.
Cameron's secret weapon was a group of talented sophomores up from the freshmen team: guards Cedric and Garland Loftis, center Bob Gantt and forward John “Bubber” Seward. All but Seward were Durham natives and had played on Paul Sykes' legendary Durham High School teams.
Duke was a member of the Southern Conference, then a 17-team league that covered the mid-Atlantic. People who don't like the ACC's current unbalanced schedule would blanch at the old Southern Conference. Some teams played each other twice, some played once. Some didn't play at all. Wake Forest played 18 regular-season conference games in 1942; three other teams played 11. The rest were somewhere in between. The top eight teams met in the conference tournament to decide the official league champion.
Cameron also was an assistant football coach, and Duke was invited to the 1942 Rose Bowl. Assistant Gerry Gerard took over the bulk of the basketball duties until Cameron was finished with football. Gantt, who at 6-foot-4 and 220 pounds was considered a giant, was also busy with football. Duke had a modest schedule early, with only two official games in December. They easily defeated Georgetown of Kentucky and Rider, while also winning a pair of practice games over Hanes Hosiery and McCrary Textiles.
Of course, the Duke-Rider game wasn't the most important thing going on in December 1941. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7 and the subsequent United States entry into World War II put everything else on a back burner. The most dramatic effect on the Duke sports program was the decision to move the 1942 Rose Bowl from Pasadena to Durham.
The United States military buildup was immediate and substantial, but Duke and the other Southern Conference schools were allowed to complete the season as scheduled. Still, the entire season unfolded in a context where news from the front greatly overshadowed news from the court, and players had to begin thinking about a life after the season that was much different than what they had imagined a few months earlier.
Duke resumed its season after New Year's with a visit to Philadelphia for a Palestra doubleheader. In the opener St. Joseph's defeated North Carolina 33-28 while Duke fell to Temple 57-41.
Soon Cameron and Gantt were back on board and Duke went on a run. Cameron settled into a successful game plan. He would start Allen at center, Rothbaum and Spuhler at forwards, McCahan and Bill Stark at guards. This team would play the steady, methodical game characteristic of college basketball at that time, a game of weaves and patterns. About 10 minutes into the game he would insert his four sophomores and go on the attack, with an aggressive fastbreak style.
The term “fastbreak” should be viewed in context. Duke only broke the 70-point mark twice during the season. But any fastbreaks were unusual for that time and opponents were not prepared for them. Duke routinely played 10 or 11 players, adding to their opponents' fatigue.
There were impressive wins. Duke came back from Philadelphia and played five games in eight days, and won them all. The Devils ended their one-game losing streak with a 37-35 win over a Tennessee team that was 6-0 and boasted a victory over perennial national power Long Island University. Duke trailed the visiting Volunteers 30-25 late before rallying for the win. Cedric Loftis hit the game-winner with 15 seconds left. A few days later Duke trailed George Washington 37-31 with five minutes left but came back to win 38-37 on an Allen field goal.
By this point a pattern emerged. The game would be close early, perhaps Duke would even trail. But at some point Duke's depth and fastbreak chewed up opponents and Cameron's Devils would pull away down the stretch. The entry of the sophomores was met with anticipation by Duke fans and dread by opposing fans. The Devils trailed Navy and VMI at intermission but rallied for the win. They led Wake Forest 24-20 at the half and won by 22, 61-39. Duke trailed Washington & Lee 6-4 when the sophomores came in but led 28-8 at the half.
Duke's depth was matched by its balance. Although complete official statistics are unavailable, the conference did announce its top 10 scorers for conference games. Duke led the league in scoring without having any of its players in the top 10. Any one of its top nine players could lead the team in scoring on a given night.
Duke rolled through January without another loss. On Feb. 1 Duke journeyed to Chapel Hill and defeated UNC 52-40 in front of an overflow crowd of 6,500. On Feb. 16 the Devils trailed 30-21 but fought back for a 53-48 win at North Carolina State, again in front of a standing-room only crowd. The winning steak ended at 14 when Duke fell at George Washington 55-53, losing on a late shot by Bobby Gilham.
Duke ended its regular season at home with a pulsating overtime win over North Carolina. UNC led 38-36 with seconds left when a turnover and Gantt follow-shot sent the game into the extra period. A Garland Loftis free throw and a Spuhler layup gave Duke a 41-38 lead, which it tenaciously held on to for a 41-40 victory.
The Southern Conference Tournament was held in Raleigh's Memorial Auditorium, which seated barely 4,000 fans. Duke cruised to a 59-41 win over Washington & Lee in the opener. The semifinal game was much tighter. Duke and Wake Forest were tied at 33 with 10 minutes left before Duke wore down the thinner Deacons for a 54-45 win. The game's leading scorer with 20 points was Wake center Herb Cline, whose son Mark would play for the Deacons in the 1980s.
North Carolina State edged William & Mary 53-52 in the other semifinal. State, then known as the Red Terrors, was led by 6-6 Horace “Bones” McKinney, the best player on Sykes' Durham High School teams and the league's top scorer. Duke led 20-19 in the title game before making its signature move after intermission.
In the words of sportswriter Dick Herbert, “Duke was breaking fast following pass interceptions, and there were a lot of those because of the close guarding and because the weary Terrors were making more than their usual share of bad passes.” Duke won 45-34. Allen led the balanced attack with 10 points and combined with Gantt to hold McKinney to 11 points, four below his average. Spuhler made the All-Tournament first team, Cedric Loftis the second team.
The NCAA Tournament considered Duke for one of its eight spots but gave the Southeast bid to Adolph Rupp and his Kentucky Wildcats. The NIT sent out feelers but Cameron rebuffed them, saying “the war emergency had made it impossible for members of the Duke team to extend its season.” Duke had moved its final exams up three weeks and several of the players had added ROTC, flight training and other military activities to their schedules. It's not clear if Duke would have accepted an NCAA invite.
Eddie Cameron didn't know it at the time, but the State game was his last basketball game as head coach. Wallace Wade enlisted in the Army in 1942 and Cameron took over as head football coach. Gerard became head basketball coach.
Cameron never did coach a game in the postseason. Duke ended the 1942 season at 22-2, setting a school record for wins that wouldn't be bettered until 1963 and posting a winning percentage bettered only by Duke's 1986, 1992 and 1999 teams.
That's certainly going out on top.
Jim Sumner will sign copies of his new book, Tales from the Duke Blue Devils Hardwood, on Jan. 28 from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. at Barnes & Noble in Durham's New Hope Commons.
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