Note: As spring sports have been canceled this semester, the athletic communication office will be adding a weekly Washburn Wednesday to the website. Today's first edition will be the 1924-25 AAU National Championship basketball team.

In 1925 Dutch Lonborg coached Washburn College to an AAU title; it was the last time a college team won that championship. He was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1973 as a coach.

Information on the championship game reprinted from the book "Ichabod Excellence: The Washburn Basketball History" by David Smale

Any student of journalism, and for that matter, any student of the game of basketball, enjoys reading stories written about the game during its early years. Descriptive, colorful and metaphoric narrations tell about the country's newfound adoration of this exciting game.

Certainly, C.E. McBride's recounting of Washburn's AAU National Basketball Tourna­ment championship in 1925 is one worth reading, nay, studying. What follows is McBride's story, exactly as it appeared in The Kansas City Star on March 15, 1925:

From out of Topeka, state capital of Kansas, there came a violent windstorm last night. Hil­lyard basketball players got in its path and were hurled back to St. Joseph. Hillyard rooters were met by its violence, pocketbooks were emptied and hopes blown asunder.

It swooped down upon Convention hall. It spent a hectic hour scattering Hillyard champion­ship ambitions and then soared back to Topeka, state capital of Kansas.

This combination of windstorm, typhoon, tornado and squall was manned by five pilots. Breithaupt and McLaughlin fired the furnace so that the wind blew always lustily; Spohn held the reins and then drove incessantly after the Hil­lyards; Brewster and Lowe were defenders against the Hillyard breeze, a mild and mid-summer breeze which was less than alarming a fitful breeze which had neither the power nor the staying qualities of the fiercely driving wind from Kansas.

The Score-42 to 30

The National A.AU. basket ball championship has descended upon the Washburn college team, coached by "Dutch" Lonborg. In a 42 to 30 contest in which the Hillyards, the favorites, were routed from the opening whistle, these clean limbed, lithe athletes from the Kansas state school dribbled and passed and drove their way to the nation's highest court honors while a crowd of seven thousand watched in amazed wonder.

Before the game Hillyard supporters were offering odds on the crew led by DeBernardi. They were exultant in anticipating victory, they sang and they chanted of the triumph that was to come and they were ready to receive the title cup and take it back to St. Joseph.
Five mi
nutes after the opening of this struggle their cries were stilled. You ask why they were stilled? Out on the court there was this wind from Topeka and it was charging through the St. Joseph defense, it was routing and despoiling the Hil­lyard offense, it blew all but DeBernardi off the court. This is what they saw and the cries now were pleadings. They saw DeBernardi, alone of that crew, fighting a desperate game against five college athletes who capered and frolicked as though it were a holiday occasion.

The Hillyard Defense Crumbled
Five minutes after the beginning Washburn held a 4-point lead. The Hillyard 5-man defense, the same barrier which had so disorganized the Blue Diamond attack, was being whipped to pieces, it was being driven back, it became disor­ganized. Those who thought no team could pierce through found these Washburn players darting in and out as though they were alone on the court and the Hillyard players mere dummies, immov­able targets.

Then "Butch" Lowe, Washburn floor guard, started and the wind blew more furious yet. Three times this star come down the court and three times he flipped the sphere toward the basket and as many times the leather disc parting the netting, clean as a bone that is gnawed by a hungry dog. Spohn, elongated Washburn center, obtained a short pass and he raised to shoot. Starbuck, Hillyard guard, clung to him but the goal was made and Starbuck was fouled. Spohn made both the free attempts.

Up, up, up went the Washburn score. Down, down, down went the Hillyard hopes. The spon­sor of the team saw his dreams floundering like a boar in an angry sea and his face bespoke the mental anguish he was under.

A  Washburn Crowd

A Washburn fan became excited and he hurled his coat to the floor. Amid the riotous confusion there was heard a sharp crack and a pungent odor suffused the air about the coat. 

If Washburn wins I don't care about that bottle," he shouted. Now back to the start of this titanic struggle.

The air is super-charged with supreme excitement as Spohn and DeBernardi face each other in the center ring. There is a momentary hush and then the ball is tipped.

A few skirmishes follow. Without any prelimi­naries, Washburn drives through to the Hillyard goal, but the shot is missed and soon DeBernardi emerges from a scramble, he eludes his guard, side-steps and flips the ball through the rim.

The battle is now fierce. The wind from Topeka is at its height. A pair of free throws are exchanged and then Spohn bounds in under the basket, he dodges his guard and scores. And then he drops in a short shot from the free throw line. The half is over with Washburn leading, 27 to 11.

It is the end. The crowd knows it. Only aid from the gods could turn back such an irresistible force as this one from Topeka. The tournament final game never has pro­duced a more spectacular, thorough upset.

But the Kansas winds are strong and they blow a devas­tating gale once they get under way. Many stories are told of the Kansas windstorms and now you may add this to the collection: That the Hillyards were caught in such a wind in Convention hall last night and thoughts of a national championship were blown away from them and well lined pocketbooks were turned inside out and happy, exultant faces were changed to faces, sorrowful and sad.

The Kansas winds are mighty, mighty powerful. 


1924-25 season results
15-0
Head Coach -- AC Lonborg
AAU?National Champions
Baker W 35-22
Emporia State W 32-22
Ottawa W 23-20
Emporia State W 30-29
Southwestern W 42-22
Kansas Wesleyan W 35-21
Southwestern W 45-18
College of Emporia W 32-18
Sterling W 35-24
Ottawa W 28-20
*Ke-Nash-A Wisc. W 30-28
*Pastime Boat & AC W 39-16
*St. Phillips AC W 34-11
*Monon Club W 45-33
*Hillyards W 42-30
*AAU National Tournament