Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 16, 1993 TAG: 9301160019
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: STILLWATER, OKLA. LENGTH: Medium
PIONEER COACH IBA DIES
Hank Iba began playing basketball on dirt courts in rural Missouri, wearing uniforms sewn by his mother. He became one of the great coaches in history, a man whose influence is still felt amid the glitz of today's multi-million dollar game.Iba died of heart failure early Friday. He was 88. He had been hospitalized since Wednesday.
"Of all the shadows that cast over the game of basketball, his was the biggest," Indiana coach Bob Knight said in a statement.
Knight was one of the many coaches Iba influenced with his preachings of sound defense and a patient, ball-control offense. Iba won 767 games in 41 years, second most in history, and led Oklahoma State - then called Oklahoma A&M - to national championships in 1945 and '46.
Iba coached the U.S. Olympic team three times. His teams won gold medals in 1964 and '68, then lost to the Soviet Union in 1972 in one of the most controversial games ever.
It was ironic that Iba, one of the game's great winners, came to be so closely tied to a loss. The United States appeared to have won the game in regulation. But the clock was reset twice, giving the Soviets three chances to score the game-winning basket.
"We won the game, no question about it," Iba said in an interview with The Associated Press in February 1990. "That thing was over."
The loss was so bitter, no members of the U.S. team accepted their silver medals.
Knight was especially close to Iba. In 1984, when he coached the Olympic team, Knight asked Iba to serve as a special assistant coach and speak to the team each day at practice. After winning the gold medal, the players honored Iba by carrying him on their shoulders around the court.
"There weren't many of us who knew what was going on that didn't have tears in our eyes," said Bill Wall, former executive director of USA Basketball, the sport's national governing body. "Maybe some of those kids didn't know who he was, but each of them had just spent a month with him."
The coaching ranks are filled with Iba disciples, including current Oklahoma State coach Eddie Sutton.
"He began his career with coaches like Phog Allen and Adolph Rupp and finished with Dean Smith and Bobby Knight and all the people recognized what he had given to the game," Sutton said. "They all admired the class that he brought to the game."
Iba was born Aug. 6, 1904, in Easton, Mo. He began his coaching career in 1927 at Classen High School in Oklahoma City. After two seasons there, he went to Maryville Teachers College in Missouri.
He spent four seasons at Maryville and one year at the University of Colorado before taking over at Oklahoma A&M, where he coached 36 years and won 655 games.
"Mr. Iba was not a great recruiter," said Bob Kurland, who helped lead Oklahoma A&M to its consecutive NCAA titles. "He felt he was a teacher. If people wanted to play the game of basketball, they would come to him. And they did."
Iba did it through hard work. If he didn't like what he saw during an afternoon practice session, he was likely to bring his players back that night to work more.
Hank Iba's son, Moe, coaches at Texas Christian, and his nephew, Gene, coached at Baylor until last season.