maly, too: Flashback: A Relic Of a Basketball Arena, Bugs Bagstad, Otis Dypwick and a Rookie Sports Editor

Thursday, January 15, 2015

Flashback: A Relic Of a Basketball Arena, Bugs Bagstad, Otis Dypwick and a Rookie Sports Editor

By RON MALY

While watching on TV as Iowa beat Minnesota, 77-75, in a Big Ten basketball game a couple of nights ago, I went into rewind.

The game was played at Williams Arena, a relic of a place on the Minnesota campus.

The Barn

People often refer to Williams Arena now as The Barn.

One reason they call it The Barn is because it's so old.

I mean, Williams Arena was old when I saw my first game there more than a half-century ago.

I had just gotten my degree from the University of Iowa in January, 1958, and I was in my first few months of being sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune.

Even though the Albert Lea Tigers weren't a good basketball team that season, and weren't threats to make it to the state high school tournament, my boss and I thought it would be a good idea for me to cover the tournament.

The event, which lasted nearly a week, was held at Williams Arena, which then had a seating capacity of more than 18,000.

Because I knew little about Minneapolis, the boss thought it would be a good idea to send someone with me to show me around the big city.

He chose Palmer "Bugs" Bagstad, a longtime sports fan who worked in the printing department at my paper.

Bugs' job was to drive me to Minneapolis, and to get me to wherever I needed to be.

His reward was free lodging in Minneapolis and a ticket to all of the games in the tournament.

It was a good deal for Bugs and a good deal for me.

I had obtained a press credential to the tournament from Otis Dypwick, who then was the sports information at the University of Minnesota.

Dypwick and his staff were responsible for media credentials, scorekeeping and setting up interviews at the tournament.

With a guy who had an unforgettable name like Otis Dypwick, you had to figure he was pretty darn knowledgeable and pretty darn important.

Otis Dypwick certainly was both.

Otis was also a very nice man.

I was 22 years of age when I covered the tournament, but probably looked [and maybe sometimes acted] like I was 15.

I had a lot of questions for Otis Dypwick during that high school tournament, and he patiently answered all of them.

It didn't make any difference that I was a rookie sports editor from a smalltown southern Minnesota paper.

He treated me with as much respect as he treated the reporters from Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Thanks, Otis Dypwick, and thanks, Bugs Bagstad, for making my first trip to Williams Arena a pleasure.

In 1958, I wasn't surprised by the noise generated inside Williams Arena because I had watched many games--of both the high school and collegiate variety--at Iowa Fieldhouse in Iowa City, another relic of a place.

A huge difference between Williams Arena and Iowa Fieldhouse is that Minnesota still plays its games at Williams and Iowa now plays in Carver-Hawkeye Arena.

Williams Arena has undergone a number of revisions over the years. Indeed, its seating capacity is now 14,625--down from the 18,025 shoehorned into the place when I saw my first game there.

Thank goodness for modern fire laws.

I covered many basketball games, of course, at Williams Arena after leaving Albert Lea.

There were lots of thrills and, yes, some frustrations, too, while watching Hawkeye teams coached by Ralph Miller, Dick Schultz, Lute Olson, George Raveling and Tom Davis take teams into an arena that has a strange raised floor.

The players' benches and the tables where the official scorers sit are two feet below the playing court.

Head coaches are permitted to stand on the court, above the benches, during games.

I certainly heard no complaints about the seating [or standing] arrangements from Iowa coach Fran McCaffery after this week's victory at Williams Arena.

Right now, he's got to be thinking The Barn isn't a bad place to stand [or play] at all.

JOLTIN' JOE GOT IT STARTED

When Ron Maly was a kid in Cedar Rapids, he wanted to enter an essay contest, and he did. He wrote about Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees being his favorite baseball player. For finishing second in the contest, Ron won a Louisville Slugger baseball bat autographed by DiMaggio. Ron later wanted to be the first person in his family to attend college, and he was. He earned a degree in political science from the University of Iowa, and did what all political science majors do. He became a sportswriter. He had, after all, covered high school football, basketball and baseball games for the Cedar Rapids Gazette while he worked parttime during his university days. Ron wanted to sit in the press box and write about an Iowa-Minnesota football game, and he did. It happened while he was the sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune, and the game was at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Ron wanted to cover a World Series, and he did. Also when he was working for the Albert Lea newspaper. Ron wanted to cover Rose Bowls, Sugar Bowls, Orange Bowls, Cotton Bowls, Holiday Bowls, a Freedom Bowl, a Sun Bowl, a Super Bowl and NCAA basketball tournaments, and he did those things after he moved to Des Moines. Ron was a four-time sportswriter of the Year in the state of Iowa [the years were 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996]. In 2006, he was named a charter member of the University of Iowa's media Wall of Fame in the Kinnick Stadium press box. A photo of the plaque that's displayed in the press box is displayed above this story. Following Ron's retirement from the newspaper business, a publisher asked him if he wanted to write a book about the rich football tradition at the University of Iowa, and he did. The hardback version of "Tales from the Iowa Sidelines" was a best-seller, and so was the revised, softback version. Now he's been asked by his publisher to update the book for a second time. He's in the process of doing that at the present time. Ron considers being asked to update a best-selling book for the second time to be the supreme compliment, considering the Hawkeyes won just four games in the 2012 season. When Ron isn't working on books, he's busy traveling and spending time with his family. Indeed, he attends the athletic, theatrical and musical [both vocal and instrumental] events in which his six grandchildren participate. He also writes about anything that interests him for his many websites. Every chance he gets, Ron proudly wears his America Needs Farmers T-shirt.

The Hawkeyes' Rich Football Tradition, Revisited

I mentioned a while back that I was in the process of updating my Tales from the Iowa Sidelines book. Updating it for the second time. The original hardback edition of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines [pictured at the right] was published in 2003, during the 10-3 season, when coach Kirk Ferentz and his Iowa football team had a 10-3 record that included a 37-17 victory over 15th-ranked Florida in the Outback Bowl and after the Hawkeyes went 11-2 in 2002. That book was a best-seller, so the publishers came to me again in 2005, a season that finished with a breathtaking 30-25 victory over No. 11 Louisiana State in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, 2005. Because buyers had cleaned out the the shelves in the bookstores, the publishers wanted to know if I'd do an updated version of the book. I agreed, The revised, soft-cover edition [pictured at the left] was published in 2005. Warren Holloway, who teamed with quarterback Drew Tate on a miraculous 56-yard touchdown pass to win the Capital One Bowl, was featured on the cover. That book, too, turned into a best-seller, So I had reason to feel very good about my years as a published author. It's not every day that a the original version is a best-seller, and so is the updated version. Then, imagine my surprise when I received an e-mail from a senior editor at the publishing company last fall, wanting wanted to know if I was interested in doing a second updated version of the book. It came at a time when things weren't going well for the Hawkeyes in the 2012 season. They lost their last six games and finished with a 4-8 record. Frankly, the thought of doing a revised edition of the book during a 4-8 season seemed to be a stretch. "Maybe producing a revised edition in a year or two would be a better idea," I told the publishers. "We'd like to do it now," I was told. "Let me think about it," I said. After a few days of thought, I accepted the idea. I talked myself into the idea that this was the supreme compliment--being asked to do a second book update during a 4-8 season showed strong confidence by the publishers in me and in the Hawkeyes' football program. So I got back into the business of interviewing players and coaches again, going to postgame press conferences, weekly press conferences and a scrimmage in West Des Moines. After a press conference in Iowa City, I did a one-on-one interview with coach Kirk Ferentz, and mentioned to him that I was in the process of doing a revised edition of my two best-selling books. I congratulated him on the excellent things he had done for Iowa's football program--all of which contributed to the success of my books. "I think Coach Fry had more to do with it," he told me, bringing up the name of Hayden Fry, his one-time boss at Iowa and a man who brought Iowa's football program back from the dead in the 20th century. That's modest Kirk Ferentz for you. Even though the 2012 season wasn't something Hawkeye coaches, players and fans will recall with any special feeling, Ferentz has a 14-year record of 100-74 at Iowa that includes two 11-victory seasons [2002 smd 2009], two 10-victory seasons [2003 and 2004], plus he's been the Big Ten coach of year in 2002, 2004 and 2009, and national coach of the year in 2002. Indeed, Ferentz has done some wonderful things at Iowa City, and I fully expect his success to continue. I've concluded my writing for the second update of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines, and the senior editor has furnished me with an early look at the book. Not only are the Kirk Ferentz years included in the updated version, but so is the stuff I previously wrote about Howard Jones, Dr. Eddie Anderson, Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick and the 1939 Hawkeye Ironmen, Ronald Reagan, Ozzie Simmons, Ossie Solem, Randy Duncan, Alex Karras and lots of other legends from Iowa's rich football history. I expect the book to be in stores soon. I hope you like it.