The Gunners Are After Cincy

The pregame drama was not consistent with the game itself, which tailed off in excitement after the opening minutes. The two captains, Loyola's Harkness, one of four Negroes on the starting team, and State's Joe Dan Gold, shook hands as a battery of photographers recorded the moment. A bruising, but exceptionally clean, game followed. The Maroons, in their methodical way, took a 7-0 lead. Loyola, a team that had averaged 94 points a game, was scoreless after nearly six minutes. The sound of cowbells, stamped with Confederate flags and wielded by a knot of State students who had driven north for the tournament, filled the field house. Then Loyola began to hit and, more important, tightened its defense. It pulled ahead 26-19 by the half and won convincingly, 61-51.

"They showed they're good boys," said George Ireland after the game. "Just like ours."

The West regional of the NCAA was played in the Brigham Young field house in Provo, Utah, where on Friday night 9,704 people watched Arizona State pulverize UCLA 93-79. Not a man jack there would have given a cup of warm milk for Oregon State's chances on Saturday. The question was not whether the Sun Devils would beat OSU, but would they beat Cincinnati in Louisville? Oregon State Coach Slats Gill had permitted his Beavers to see the first half of the UCLA-Arizona State game following their 65-61 opening-round victory over San Francisco. "I don't usually allow it," he told his team, "but I'm delighted the way you played." The Beavers sat through the first half, open-mouthed at ASU's awesome show of power. Slats, abashed, bade them goodnight and sent them to their motel. Said Terry Baker, the All-America football quarterback and the basketball team's quarterback, too, "I was scared. They looked awful tough."

Gill stayed on for the lopsided finish and drew this conclusion: no team could be that good two nights in a row. Arizona State wasn't. The next night, 7-foot Mel Counts controlled the tip for Oregon State, Forward Steve Pauly dribbled to the corner and popped in a field goal. The Beavers were ahead 2-0, a lead they were never to lose. Counts headquartered near the key and Pauly stayed in the right corner while Playmaker Baker consistently picked them out with his neat passes. Pauly, meanwhile, put a clamper on Arizona State's 6-foot-6 Joe Caldwell. Oregon State's lead crept out to eight points, 10, 12, then 16. Finally it was apparent: there would be no Arizona State explosion. It had been spent the night before. Never really pressed, Oregon State won by the hardly believable score of 83-65.

What chance does this give Oregon State against Cincinnati? Not a good one, really. No team can figure on Cincinnati having an off night offensively because you can barely tell when the Cincinnati offense is "on" anyway. It is defense the Bearcats play, and though Texas gave them heartburn and Colorado made them hustle, they should handle Oregon State, Baker notwithstanding. A Saturday night championship game between Cincinnati and Duke would match the best two teams in the country and is (like last year's Cincinnati-Ohio State final) the classic pairing of Defense vs. Offense. However, Loyola, for all its undisciplined, madcap ways, has looked hatter than anybody in the regionals, and should it make the finals it would provide a Defense vs. Offense pairing, too. Either way, a couple of gunners are loose in Louisville, and Cincy is their target.