Legends of Maryland Basketball

BOSEY

BERGER

Bosey Berger is considered one of the best athletes in the history of Maryland athletics. By the time he left Maryland in 1932 to pursue a professional baseball career, Berger was a two-time All-American in basketball and a prominent football and baseball player for the Terps. Maryland’s football coach at the time, Curley Byrd, said he could have made Berger into a 49-second quarter-miler. His accomplishments were recognized more so because Maryland was an agricultural school at the time and was not considered on par athletically with many other colleges.

Berger played basketball and baseball at McKinley Tech High School in Washington, D.C. He had hoped for a scholarship at Duke, but the Blue Devils never offered him one. Berger, who was born in Baltimore, instead chose Maryland, where he was the school’s first All-America basketball player in 1931. He was the only Maryland basketball All-American in the first half of the 20th century.

The men’s basketball team had turned things around during Berger’s first year on the varsity, finishing 16-6 in the 1929-30 season, one year after finishing 7-9. But Maryland’s season ended abruptly when they lost to Kentucky in the first round of the Southern Conference Tournament.

Things were different the following year. The Terrapins won the conference title despite some solid obstacles. After the team’s leading scorer from the previous year, Bob Gaylor, quit school, they had a roster of just eight players. But it was an effective eight, including the crew from the undefeated freshman team of the 1928-29 season, led by Berger.

The second-seeded Terps beat LSU, 37-33, in the first round of the Southern Conference Tournament. In its next game against North Carolina, Maryland fell behind 13-1, but held the Tar Heels to only one second-half point and won 19-17. Berger made the game winner, but Maryland missed often that day Their field goal percentage was only .094. Berger converted a free throw that clinched a 26-25 semifinal win over Georgia, but he saved his best for last in the championship game against Kentucky.

Using an offensive scheme that stressed setting picks and cutting to the basket, Maryland led 18-7 at the half. But Kentucky took a two-point lead with two minutes remaining, signaled by the timekeeper raising his gun in the air. Ed Ronkin then fed Berger for a basket to tie the game. After Maryland rebounded a missed Kentucky free throw, Ronkin and Berger teamed up again. Berger’s lay-up won the game for Maryland.

Ronkin secured the win by stealing the next jump-tap, and after Berger missed a shot that would have iced the win, both teams fell on the floor from exhaustion. I didn’t even know how much time there was to go, and I wasn’t sure we had any more timeouts, Berger said in the book Maryland Basketball: Red, White and Amen. Some people later said (the game-winning shot) went right through the basket, but it hit the rim and went up and in.

Writers formulated high praise for the player many called the best in Southern Conference history, and for good reason. Berger averaged 19.1 points per game in the nine regular season conference games during his senior year, an amazing feat considering Maryland averaged just 34 points per game. One such scribe was Curley Byrd, Maryland’s athletic director who wrote articles for the old Washington Star newspaper.

Byrd wrote, No coach, no system of coaching, can supply the kind of thing that inspired Berger to break through in the closing seconds to score points that prevented his team’s defeat. When a man pulls himself together as the second hand of a watch ticks halfway around, that man has in him some quality that no coach can give him or produce for him.

Of Berger, the Atlanta journal wrote: Louis Berger was born with blood of ice and nerves of steel and the old heart and brains that could keep functioning when others around him were twittering with dismay.

Berger had fun with athletics.

He was real, real likeable, said Harry Hess, the basketball manager from 1929 to 1931 in Maryland Basketball. He horsed around a little bit and kept the spirits up. He was not swell-headed at all, a fun guy and a picture (perfect) athlete.

Berger was also good enough in baseball to play six years for three teams in Major League Baseball. The Bosey Berger Award has been given annually since 1935 to Maryland’s top senior player.

BURTON

SHIPLEY

H. Burton Shipley was Maryland’s first basketball coach of promi-nence, but his legend extends beyond the hardwoods. He served as the football team’s waterboy in 1896 and earned 16 varsity letters while attending the college from 1908 to 1914. He was also captain of the football, baseball and basketball teams.

Shipley claimed he was chosen captain of the basketball team because he played football. And it appears he approached both games with vigor.

We had an old gym with two pillars in it and played most of our games ... in a Sunday School gymnasium, he said in the book, Maryland Basketball: Red, White and Amen. We didn’t have an out of bounds, and the walls had radiators in them, which you could bump your opponent into.

Shipley showcased his attacking attributes on the football field as Maryland’s starting quarterback for three years. On the basketball court, he was strictly a defensive enforcer. As a back guard, he protected Maryland’s basket and tried to shut down the opposing team’s best player.

I used to stomp my foot to distract ’em, said Shipley in Red, White and Amen. I couldn’t shoot. I was a terrible shot.

Shipley claims he learned about the long pass and the zone defense from University of Illinois basketball coach Ralph Jones while he studied first aid at the school. Later, he implemented the techniques while coaching at several different colleges, and shared the idea with former Maryland star athlete Curley Byrd, then Maryland’s athletic director and head basketball coach. Byrd liked the idea.

I came back to Maryland a little while later, and the players told me that Byrd had really thought up something good, a zone, Shipley said in Red, White and Amen.

Byrd rewarded Shipley for his innovative ways, selecting him as Maryland’s new head basketball coach in 1923. He went on to coach Maryland for 24 seasons, still the longest of any coach in the history of the program.

The 1923-24 team was considered the school’s first varsity team for the sport. The team started playing its games that year in a new facility called The Gymnasium, located in Annapolis Hall on the south part of campus.

It took just two seasons for Shipley to fashion his first winning season. Maryland quickly established itself as a prominent Southern Conference team, finishing in fourth place in the 1925 and 1926 seasons, and in third place in the 1928 season. A few years later, Maryland reached the pinnacle of Shipley’s coaching career.

The 1930-31 season started ominously for Maryland. Because so many basketball players played football for Maryland, the team did not start practice until after Christmas, after every other area team had already started practicing. Also, the team’s leading scorer the previous season, Bob Wilson, quit school, reducing the roster to eight players.

But six other players returned to the team. Bosey Berger was the most prized possession. Berger was a two-time basketball All-American at Maryland and is considered one of Maryland’s all-time greatest athletes. Berger, a 6-2 forward, was considered one of the team’s best shooters.

Maryland compiled its best regular-season record to date, 14-4, and then went on to win its first Southern Conference tournament title. They ended the year with Shipley’s best record, 18-4. The next season, Maryland finished 16-4 and was Southern Conference regular-season co-champions.

Shipley completed his 24 seasons as Maryland coach with a 243-199 record. The Ship was equally renowned for his colorful personality. His sense of humor stimulates all those with whom he associates on campus, wrote the Baltimore Sun in 1951.

A fan once hit him in the head with a water bag.

I remember a time they got rowdy during one game, said Shipley, in Maryland Basketball: Red, White and Amen. Things weren’t going so well. Somebody yelled through the quiet, ‘Do Somethin’, Ship!’

Shipley’s daughter later named a racehorse after the expression.

Late in his career as Maryland basketball coach, Shipley chased Tommy Mont into the locker room after the player made a mistake that cost the team a game. The players led him in to the shower and turned the water on the coach, saying, You’re all wet, Ship.

After Shipley was ejected from his final game as Maryland’s baseball coach, he sat down on a chair outside the dugout and refused to leave the field. The umpire let him remain in the stadium that still bears his name.

Shipley coached his last team at Maryland in 1960, leaving behind one of the more compelling athletic careers at Maryland.

Maryland Athletics, Media Relations

GENE

SHUE

Gene Shue entered the University of Maryland when a basketball revolution was beginning in College Park, compliments of new head coach Bud Millikan. Before Millikan began his 17-year career with the Terps in 1950, Maryland basketball recorded a winning season just one time in the previous 10 years. Millikan completed his first year as head coach in 1951 with a 16-11 record. That year, Shue was developing into a future player of prominence with Maryland’s freshman team, a player who would jump start Maryland basketball’s second generation of conference contention and national respectability.

Before he took his first jump shot in College Park, it seemed Shue was an unlikely savior of a program gone bad. Shue was considered too small for basketball when he entered Towson Catholic High School in Baltimore only five foot three, prompting the nicknames little mouse and bones.

But Shue turned out to be Millikan’s most prized recruit during the coach’s early years in the 1950s. A supporter of Maryland athletics informed Millikan about Shue’s talents. During that time, recruits were able to take part in tryouts against other players, and Millikan said he saw right away that Shue was a hard worker with a lot of talent.

Several schools, mostly from the Baltimore-Washington area, recruited Shue out of high school. Shue wanted to attend Georgetown, but he struggled during two tryouts and Georgetown was waiting on a decision from another player. Millikan gave Shue 10 days to give him an answer. Shue accepted a deal at Maryland that required him to work odd jobs in his dormitory at Ritchie Coliseum, where the Terps played their home games, and later sweep the floor of the coliseum in exchange for a scholarship. He earned a full scholarship his senior year.

We used to come down and turn the lights on and play basketball late at night, said Shue. Basketball was our life in those days.

Shue was considered a complete player, He was a sturdy rebounder and adept at the two-handed set shot. An emotionless demeanor belied his intensity. Millikan once called him a deadpan performer