A few years ago, I read the book "The Secret Game: A Wartime Story of Courage, Change, and Basketball's Lost Triumph" by Scott Ellsworth. It described the story of the first game in the south between all white Duke BB players and an all African American players from the North Carolina College for Negroes, coached John McLendon (a KU Alumnus). No audience, just players playing against each other in secret.
The book is a fun read but could have been written a little better.
Last night as I was watching the play-in game involving North Carolina Central University and North Dakota State, I remembered that North Carolina College for Negroes became North Carolina Central University. I was pulling for NCCU because the winner of that game was to play Duke. Too bad NCCU lost the led in the last few minutes. No, unlike 1943, NCCU would not have beaten Duke, but how ironic that a NCCU/Duke game could have taken place 76 years later, with the game NOT so secret, especially with an African American player like Zion so prominent playing for Duke.
