50th Anniversary Of The Final Four Game That Changed History

The NCAA Men's Final Four comes to my hometown this weekend.  How apropos is it that we're hosting the game at NRG Stadium at a time in which we also are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the 1966 Final Four title game between Texas Western (now UTEP) and number one ranked Kentucky that changed not only history, but had a major impact of how NCAA men's basketball is played today.

The story is also depicted in the 2006 movie Glory Road.

That Final Four game played on March 19, 1966 pitted the number four ranked Miners against the Adolph Rupp coached Wildcat team that had NBA legends Pat Riley and Louie Dampier in their lineup.

It's also a point of pride for us in Houston because David Lattin, one of the starters in that historic NCAA title game is from here.  That game also marked the first time that five African-Americans started in an NCAA title game,and they were playing against a one loss Kentucky team with an all white lineup.  

While that is something we don't even think about in 2016, because the SEC and the now disbanded Texas-Arkansas based Southwest Conference were segregated and refused to recruit Black players, this was a big deal in 1966.  It was also a big deal because in addition to this seminal title game being played with the African-American Civil Rights Movement as a backdrop, there were less than complimentary stereotypes about Black basketball players at the time as well.   The Texas Western players also faced in their 27-1 title run racism from fans, other players and referees as they marched toward their date with destiny.

David Lattin, Bobby Joe Hill, Orsten Artis, Harry Flournoy and Willie Worsley shocked the world by upsetting the heavily favored Wildcats 72-65  It's also cool to note that David Lattin's grandson, Khadeem Lattin ( and whose mother BTW is WNBA Houston Comets legend Monica Lamb) playing for the Oklahoma Sooners, one of the four teams competing for the NCAA title here in Houston this weekend

 It is also fitting that during this weekend in which the Final Four returns to the Lone Star State, the 1966 NCAA championship team will be honored at halftime.on Saturday.

As I said in my 45th anniversary TransGriot post concerning that historic game, the Texas Western players that night in Cole Field House on the University of Maryland campus were playing not only for a title, they were playing for the dignity of a people.

They also ended up with their win,.changing NCAA college basketball forever.

Shut Up Fool Awards- Post 2014 Midterm Election Edition

Well peeps, the election didn't go the way we wished it to go, and we now have to deal with when the 114th Congress starts in January the specter of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

For all you liberal progressive people who didn't vote, for all you didn't do on Election Day, the new GOP majorities on Capitol Hill are the result.  

So when they gleefully start repealing the 20th century over the next two years, don't look at me because I and other peeps tried to warn you what was coming if they got their paws on the Senate in addition to having control of the House.

And I'll be saying, "I told you so."

Okay, so while I'm traveling to the Windy City for the Representing Trans* Symposium that's happening on the University of Chicago campus tomorrow (and hope to see you Chicago peeps while I'm there) let's get to my usual Friday 'bidness' of calling out the fool, fools or groups of fools who deserve to get lambasted for their arrogance, stupidity, and jaw dropping WTF level ignorance.

Honorable mention number one goes to 'errbody' eligible to vote in the 2014 midterms who came up with whatever weak ass excuse NOT to do so.   

I'll will repeat this again:  If you're eligible to vote, there is NO acceptable excuse for sitting out an election.   Every rime the GOP majority does something that you don't like and you start complaining about it, the first question out of my mouth will be "did you vote in the 2014 midterms?"   If you didn't you'll be getting cussed out and the sideeye from me, so get ready for it.

Honorable mention number two goes to every white woman in Texas who voted for Greg Abbott.  Texas Black and Latina women voted for Wendy Davis, and you voted for your oppressor instead of one of your own?

Honorable mention number three goes to Anthony in San Diego, who called C-SPAN as part of the post mortem over the 2014 midterm and let loose the real reason why the GOP won the midterms: racist hatred of President Obama.

Thanks for giving me the ammo to prove once again that the Republican Party and the conservative movement is nothing more than the political arm of white supremacy.

Honorable mention number four goes to all the  Democrats who failed to run on the ACA, societal fairness. and embrace President Obama.  Gee, how did that work out for you on election night?

I can tell you that those House and Senate candidates who did embrace Democratic values and didn't run from the president won Tuesday night.

Honorable mention number five is Joe Rogan, who once again ignored the mounting evidence and went back to transphobically bashing Fallon Fox. 

Joe , you owe my talented WMMA homegirl an apology which I suspect will come the same time that Ronda Rousey's transphobic behind gets into the cage with Fallon

Honorable mention number six is a local fool in Houston Pastor Willie Davis, who while christopimpin' for his GOP massas opened his mouth and said the HERO would take away rights from heterosexuals?

Conservakneegrow please!  Pay very close attention.  One of the 15 categories the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance bans discrimination on is RELIGION.   But I guessed you missed that point while you were kissing Dave Welch's and Max Miller's behinds.
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This week's Shut Up Fool winner I go straight (pun intended) to New York City for in Pastor James David Manning, the head of the ATLAH hate church there who is making a late run for the 2014 Shut Up Fool of the Year.  

He gets this week's nod for a double shot of homophobic coonery and buffoonery.

First he parted his lips to say that 'upscale sodomites' make Starbucks a 'Ground Zero for Ebola'.

Then Uncle Ruckus, er Pastor Manning took another shot at Starbucks by claiming their lattes are flavored with 'sodomite's semen'.   Hmm, wonder if the good pastor is doing wide stances in his office, because he sure does spend an awful lot of time and what little brainpower he has fixated on the LGBT community.

Any takers on how soon the cease and desist defamation legal papers should be hitting the ATLAH World Church doors from Starbucks?

Pastor James Manning, shut up fool.

HERO Updates, Notes and News- November 3

Well, the big hate rally at Riggleworld is over. and it was wonderful to see the Houston LGBT community meet those multiple violations of the Ten Commandments by Riggle and his friends with an outpouring of action.  

While his conservasheeple were buying t-shirts proclaiming they had the right to discriminate against gay peeps (and naw, you don't), we were busy collecting winter clothing and supplies for homeless LGBT youth and role modeling what real Christianity looks like.

Just to remind you peeps around the country.   Steve Riggle and his not so righteous flock don't represent the majority of Houstonians.   An overwhelming 75% of us favored passage of HERO and outnumbered the bussed in suburban haters when we testified in favor of it.  Neither do they represent the Houston clergy who testified in favor of the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance by a 2-1 margin over the hatemongering preachers.

The citizens of Houston, especially those of us who face discrimination every day, wanted this ordinance implemented back when it passed on May 28.  Unfortunately that's being prevented by a gaggle of loud and wrong ministers who want to impose their hatred on the rest of our city.

Speaking of loud and wrong preachers,  the kneegrow sellout ones of the Baptist Ministers Association of Houston and Vicinity trotted out another one to test another talking point lie.

Pastor Willie Davis laughingly tried to claim that 'HERO takes away the rights of heteros'.

Seriously?   Once again, because it seems like you missed it while kissing Dave Welch's  rump,   HERO protects all Houstonians from discrimination based on sex, race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, familial status, marital status, military status, RELIGION, disability, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender identity, and pregnancy.

So where exactly Rev Davis, does it 'take away the rights of heteros'?    If you weren't so hellbent on selling out and cooning it up for the Harris County GOP,  you'd see that the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance EXPANDS the rights of heterosexuals like Judge Alexandra Smooths-Hogan, whose discrimination case was the catalyst for passing this much needed Houston human rights advancement.

And Rev Davis, since you went there, contrary to what your misguided ally Becky Riggle said, you so called Christians don't have a right to discriminate against LGBT people either based on your misguided interpretation of scripture.

And I still have to ask the question, what are the members of the Baptist Ministers Association of Houston And Vicinity getting from the conservative movement in exchange for being the sellout melanin laden faces of this HERO repeal effort so it has the appearance of looking less overwhelmingly white and Republican that even Stevie Wonder can see it already is? 

And why are you doing the conservative movement and FOX Noise's dirty work for them?

The  other question I have to ask is this.   When will members of the local African-American media start asking the hard questions of the opponents I just asked?   When will they start calling these ministers out about opposing a long needed Houston human rights ordinance that benefits the ENTIRE African-American community?

And yeah, a message for my H-town peeps.   If you want human rights laws in Houston and in Texas, this is another TransGriot reminder to take your souls to the polls tomorrow if you haven't done so already.   Don't stop with Wendy and Leticia, hit those judicial races, too.   We need more fair minded judges on our Harris County benches instead of ideologically driven ones.

The fight to keep the HERO continues.



 

Atlanta Thrashers Are Soul Powered

I like watching hockey and one of the first games I attended as a child was the World Hockey Association inaugural game featuring the Houston Aeros and the Howe family squaring off against the Chicago Cougars.

Like any sport that is played in North America, despite the perception that it is a white man's sport, hockey has also been influenced by the creativity and presence of  the African descended people who played it.

The Nova Scotia based Coloured Hockey.League was the forerunner of the younger and white dominated National Hockey League that wasn't founded until 1917.  According to the book Black Ice, many of the things you see in the modern game in terms of the speed of play, the acrobatic goaltending styles to the slapshot created by Eddie Martin of the Halifax Eurekas were innovations created by Black hockey players

It wasn't until 1958 when Nova Scotian Willie O'Ree became the first Black player to break the color line in the then six team NHL when he joined the Boston Bruins and played in his January 18 debut game against the Montreal Canadiens.

But this bit of sporting Black history slipped under my radar.   The Atlanta Thrashers became only the second NHL team since the  2000-01  Edmonton Oilers to start five Black hockey players.

The ATL has a 31% African American population, and a large concentration of middle class affluent African Americans.   With rumors flying that the team may be headed for the same fate as the Flames, the previous Atlanta based NHL team that moved to Calgary in 1981, an ownership that admits they've been trying to sell the team since 2005 and attendance numbers that  rank 28th out of the 30 NHL teams, the Thrashers are seizing on an opportunity to introduce hockey into an untapped market for the NHL in terms of African Americans in a bid to keep professional hockey in the ATL..

As Thrashers management knows and I discovered in 1972, once you see a hockey game live, you're hooked.  The team is not only highlighting that factoid in advertising geared toward Black media outlets in the Atlanta area, Thrashers leading scorer, Minnesota native and NHL All-Star defenseman Dustin Byfuglien was interviewed this morning on the nationally syndicated Tom Joyner Morning Show.  The team is also reporting anecdotal evidence of increasing numbers of African Americans in the stands at Philips Arena as the word spreads about the Thrashers in the community and their efforts to grow the game pay off.. 

Interestingly enough, one of the Thrashers African descended players, Vancouver born winger Evander Kane, is named after former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield who lives in the Atlanta area.

The 19 year old Kane also has the distinction of being the highest drafted African descended player in NHL history when he was selected as the number 4 overall player picked in the 2009 NHL Draft.

The other African descended Thrashers players are defenseman Johnny Oduya from Sweden, and Canadian born wingers Anthony Stewart and Nigel Dawes.

The Atlanta Thrashers have made history a few times this NHL season.   There have been a few occasions this season in which a Thrasher goal and the two assists on the play setting up the goal were tallied by Black players.  


But if they are going to draw more fans in the ATL period regardless of ethnicity, they will need to step up their on ice play.   They are at the time I compile this languishing in the NHL's Southeast Division in fourth place with a 25-26-10 record.   Only the top eight teams in each conference make the Stanley Cup Playoffs and they are number 11 in the Eastern Conference standings four points out of the last Eastern Conference playoff spot

Here's hoping they get on a winning streak that gets them a playoff spot and I get to see one of the few soul powered NHL teams playing for the Stanley Cup..