Special to The Courier-Journal
At the beginning of my less-than-storied college basketball career in the early 1960s at Rice University in Houston, there were the old Baylor Bears, who played basketball in a dusty rodeo grounds, the Heart of Texas Coliseum.
There was Texas Tech, also in the old Southwest Conference, with its rowdy, boot-stomping West Texas fans playing in Lubbock Municipal Coliseum. The University of Texas played in the 4,000-seat Gregory Gymnasium, built-in 1930.
Moving closer to home in the Southeast Conference, Auburn — recently the No. 1 rated team in the nation — played basketball in the 2,500 seat Auburn Sports Arena — Charles Barkley came much later.