This is an exerpt from a manuscript I wrote years ago about Loyola's 1962-63 team, specifically the game between Loyola and Seattle that season:

Saturday, December 22, 1962 vs. Seattle at Chicago Stadium

The Chicago Basketball Writers’ luncheon was part of the hype for the first Stadium doubleheader of the year featuring #4 Loyola vs. #10 Seattle in the first game, with Bradley vs. Manhattan in the nightcap. Seattle was a big team, whose starters averaged 6’5”, while Loyola’s starters averaged 6’3”. Coach Vince Cazzetta’s Chieftains were coming into the game 5-0, having defeated Oregon State, Xavier, and Dayton.

“Our present team could be stronger than the [Elgin] Baylor teams,” Cazzetta told the luncheon crowd, referring to Seattle’s run up to the 1958 NCAA Tournament in which they lost in the championship game. “If we were playing the same schedule as those teams, I think we could win at least 24 games.

“Against Loyola, we’re going to play defense. There’s not a team in the country that can outscore them, so the best thing to do is defense them.”

Led by senior All-American Eddie Miles, who would become the Detroit Pistons’ first round draft pick later that year, the Chieftains had a potent mixture of experience and size. But Miles couldn’t get his one-handed push shot on track in the first half, going scoreless for the first 12 minutes of the game thanks in part to Jerry Harkness’ defense. And Seattle made 13 turnovers in the first half, including seven traveling violations.

The Ramblers led at halftime, and ran their lead up to 64-42 four minutes into the second half. But the Chieftains rallied behind a pressing defense while Loyola shooting went cold. Meanwhile, Miles found his shooting touch and sank 12 field goals to pace the Seattle attack. The Chieftains knocked 20 points off the Loyola lead over the next 14 and a half minutes to put the score at 82-80 Loyola with a minute and a half left in the game.

Harkness and John Egan each made two free throws to extend the lead, and Loyola outscored the Chieftains 11-3 over the last 90 seconds to secure the Ramblers’ seventh win of the season, 93-83.

Indeed, it was free throw shooting that won the game for the Ramblers. Seattle out-rebounded and out-shot the Ramblers, but Loyola hit on 29 of their 32 shots from the line.

Miles led all scorers with 25 points, all of them coming in the final 28 minutes of the game. Harkness led Loyola with 23 points, Egan added 20, and Rouse chipped in 15. But the highly-touted Ramblers showed some vulnerability in front of the 11,840 fans that showed up at their first game of the year in the Stadium.

Seattle faded from the top ten after facing Loyola, but the team earned their third consecutive at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament with a 21-5 regular season record. Coach Vince Cazzetta resigned before the end of the season, and assistant coach Clair Markey coached the team through their first-round tournament loss to Oregon State.

Eddie Miles was "the man with the golden arm", his nickname coming from a movie of the same name.

Hard to imagine us playing in front of 11,000 fans in Chicago today.

Great stuff.

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Great memory of the Chicago Stadium. My favorite was going right after the blizzard of 1967 when Loyola played UCLA with sophomore Lee Alcindor. The atmosphere was electric. Rambler lost but Walter Robertson scored on a one on one against Alcindor which brought the house down.

Mike,

I remember that play.

Hey John,
Your description brought back great memories of that game. I thought that we were going to blow it that night.

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Let's go Braden!