The Rio Grande College miracle

Editors Note: This is part one of a two-part story. Look for part two Aug. 6.

By Roy Waters

One of the greatest sports stories in our nation’s history took place in a little town in Southern Ohio during the early 1950s.

If you were a sports fan of that era, there’s no doubt you heard the story. Rio Grande College (pronounced Ri and not Re) with 92 students was seriously considering closing the doors but in the fall of 1952, two people arrived on the campus that forever changed the school.

First on the scene was a young basketball coach named Newt Oliver. He had been the leading scorer in the country as a sophomore at Rio Grande during the 1948 season. He was an honorable mention on the Converse Shoe Company All-American team that year.

After graduation, he spent two years as coach at Sandusky High School in Ohio before moving to Wellsville, a high school in the hill country of Southern Ohio bordering the Ohio River.

At his new school, Oliver met star player, 6 feet, 9 inch Bevo Francis, for the first time. Together they led Wellsville to a 23-2 record with Francis averaging 31 points per game and making every All-Ohio team.

Oliver became coach at Rio Grande in the summer of 1952 and he brought Francis along. The two led the school to notoriety no one could have ever dreamed of as they took the basketball world by storm.

When Rio Grande President Charles Davis offered Oliver the coaching job, he told him it may very well be the last year of the school’s existence. Oliver went to Don Allen, a native of Rio Grande and one of the largest Chevrolet dealers in the country, seeking support. Allen promised the money and backing needed so Oliver took the job.

As we say now, the rest is history. With several full scholarships in hand, Oliver was able to add some very good players to the team in a matter of weeks. He was given a salary of $3,500 for the first year and Francis, who was married and had a young son, was given an apartment, a scholarship, $75 a month for groceries and a 50 cents-per-hour job on campus.

Oliver, from the very beginning, set out to make his team the highest scoring team in the country and Francis the highest scorer. He succeeded as no one else could have dreamed. With a fast breaking offense built around one of the best 15-18 foot jump shooters ever, the team averaged more than 100 points a game with Francis setting a new college record of 50.1 points a game. The team won 39 games, lost none and beat their opponents by 33 a night. Francis set a new individual record of 116 points against Ashland College. Here was a school of 92 students, only 38 boys, never before heard of and they are setting some awesome records.

Before the season was half over, fans stood in line for hours to see Bevo and his teammates play. Major news services were running articles along with Life and Time magazines. Games were being switched to larger arenas and still selling out. Oliver and Francis appeared together on the Today Show and Ed Sullivan’s Toast of the Town TV shows in New York City.

Many sports writers and newscasters were going all out to get Rio Grande into the National Invitational Tournament at Madison Square Garden at the season’s end. However, the teams and coaches who were going to play in the event kept out Bevo and team.

The team, coach and Francis were given banquets, parades and awards in their hometowns that drew speakers from the top level of the nation’s press and coaches.

The nation’s basketball coaches and administrators had a different reaction to Rio Grande and its records. Many new guidelines were put in place and some were even retroactive against the Redmen.

On returning to the campus, Oliver was invited to the next meeting of the school’s trustees expecting a “pat on the back” and a nice pay raise. Instead, he was given a new set of team guidelines that restricted the team in many new ways and was given $120-a-year salary increase.

This is the end of year one in this saga and it runs only one more season. In that last season they do the impossible — beat Wake Forest with its great All-American center Dickie Hemric and play in Madison Square Garden.

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