Dec. 17, 2009
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When Vanderbilt takes the court to play Tennessee State on Dec. 19, the circumstances surrounding the game will be much different than they were when the two faced each other for the first time 35 seasons ago on Dec. 8, 1973.
Vanderbilt’s Perry Wallace had already become the first African-American scholarship basketball player in the SEC when he took the court for the 1967-68 season, but when Vanderbilt Coach Roy Skinner scheduled Tennessee State to play Vanderbilt at Memorial Gym, race relations were still touchy, especially in the South. At the time, it was an anomaly for an SEC school to play a historically African-American college.
“You can imagine that at that point in our country’s history with race relations the way they were, I think it was a courageous thing for Roy Skinner to schedule them because Vanderbilt had everything to lose in that game,” said retired Tennessean sports writer Jimmy Davy, who covered the historic game. “You particularly have to give Skinner credit since he scheduled the game. This is the same guy who recruited Perry Wallace, the first African-American player in the SEC.”
When the two met, Tennessee State was coming off a season where it finished runner-up at the NCAA Division II Championships and Vanderbilt was en route to winning the SEC title. Although, Tennessee State played in a lower division, many believed Tennessee State, led by legendary Coach Ed Martin, was a better team.
“The main reason I scheduled the game is because I kept hearing that we wouldn’t play them because we were scared of them,” Skinner said. “It finally got to me and I said, `the heck with this stuff,’ so I went for it.”
The game lived up to the hype. It was a see-saw affair that came down to the final seconds with the Commodores holding onto a 67-66 win. The Commodores were led by Jan Van Breda Kolff, while the Tigers were paced by Leonard “Truck” Robinson, who was drafted in the third round of the NBA Draft that year by Washington.
“It had been said many times that TSU could beat Vanderbilt, and as the game progressed, you felt they were right because it was very close,” Davy said. “While it was highly competitive, I think people went away knowing they’d seen a really great basketball game under very unusual circumstances for that time.”
Skinner, who was inducted into the Vanderbilt Hall of Fame in September, won 278 games as Vanderbilt’s coach–the most in school history–but the Tennessee State game was one he’ll never forget. It would be the only time he faced Tennessee State, which didn’t face the Commodores again until the 1995-96 season.
“There was a lot of pressure on that game,” Skinner said. “Not a lot schools would play Tennessee State at the time. I just remember how close it was, and I felt like if it had been on their court, they would have won. They had an awfully good team.
