Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court

Historic Loss?

The media need a story and where there isn’t one they may get a little creative. The press called our loss to Houston in 1968 “historic.” The game was played in the Houston Astrodome before the largest crowd ever to see a basketball game until then, 55,000, with millions more watching at home on television. The basketball court itself was set out in the middle of the Astrodome with the closest fans over fifty feet away.

Elvin Hayes, known as “the Big E,” was Houston’s star. Of course, the press built up the match-up he was going to have with Lew Alcindor, or “the Big A,” as they suddenly started referring to him. It became a spectacle.

What was played down in all the hoopla was the fact that Kareem had missed two-and-a-half games ...