Lone Starter from the
ST. LOUIS (AP) -To John Dick, the NCAA tournament has changed very little since 1939.
Few are left who could argue.
The 88-year-old led Oregon to the first tournament title that year, scoring 13 points as the ``Tall Firs'' defeated Ohio State at Patton Gym on the campus of Northwestern University. He's the last living starter from the last Oregon team to reach the Final Four.
``It's so much the same,'' Dick said on Saturday, the eve of Oregon's Midwest Regional final against Florida. ``The things that separate the winners from the losers don't seem to ever change.''
But the road this Oregon team - now called the Ducks - is taking is far different from the one Dick's team took to the championship.
``Intersectional play was so limited at that time, because everything was by train,'' Dick said in his low, gravely voice. ``It was a very exciting time for us.''
And very exhausting. Oregon beat California twice - the Pacific Coast Conference championship used to be a best-of-three affair - on successive nights to make the NCAA tournament. Then the team hopped on a train two days later for San Francisco and the West Regional.
``We got in there Sunday afternoon, didn't have time to practice or do anything else,'' Dick said. ``We played the first game against Texas the next day.''
Oregon trounced the Longhorns 56-41, then beat Oklahoma 55-37 to reach the national championship - six days and more than 2,000 miles away. It was back on the steam locomotive, three days and three nights with the only stops to let on passengers and take on water.
After arriving in Chicago, Dick's team had just one practice, which was cut short by a swarm of media.
``We played on Monday night and that was our fifth game against supposedly some of the better teams in 17 days, and four days and four nights on the train and no practices,'' said Dick, at the time a junior. ``Talk about home court advantage? We certainly didn't have it.''
The Buckeyes were playing on a Big Ten floor with Big Ten officials, but none of that mattered. Oregon won 46-33.
``All the teams are relatively bigger and faster and those things today,'' Dick said, ``but you play who you play, the players at the time.''
Dick volunteered for the Navy after the attack on Pearl Harbor, beginning a 32-year military career. He retired in 1973 with the rank of rear admiral and considered settling in San Diego. But together with his wife, an Oregon alum who grew up next door in a little burg called The Dalles, Dick settled in Eugene, Ore., and continued a lifelong love for the university.
He's been a season-ticket holder in football, basketball and track for more than three decades. Baseball, too, when the Ducks still had a team. Until 1999, Dick never missed a men's basketball game at McArthur Court and made every big one on the road.
``They were in the Elite Eight five years ago. I was with them on that occasion,'' Dick said. ``We were in Wisconsin and they finally lost to Kansas, which had a great team with Drew Gooden and Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich.''
When the Ducks beat Winthrop in Spokane, Wash., to reach the regional semifinals, coach Ernie Kent tried to put into words Dick's commitment to the program.
``I went to school at Oregon,'' he said. ``I'm a Duck at heart and will always be a Duck and the admiral is the same way.''
A 76-72 win over UNLV on Friday, which sent the Ducks to the Midwest Regional final, was their 29th on the season and tied the '39 team for the second-most in school history.
But all of that is lost on guard Tajuan Porter. Asked if the 5-foot-6 freshman would fit in with the Tall Firs, he replied: ``I don't really know what you're talking about.''
Few people do these days, 68 years later. But the memories are still fresh in Dick's mind, as if he could suit up for his beloved Oregon tomorrow. In a way he can, living vicariously through a team whose last stop, he hopes, is the Final Four in Atlanta.
``I'll be there,'' he said, ``unless I break my leg or somebody shoots me.''
