Cat Tales: Birge moves up to officiating the Big 10

(This is excerpt #7 from the book currently being written by Greg Eckerle called “Cat Tales: Jasper Sports Stories.” Eckerle can be reached at gregeckerle@twc.com.)

One of the most unusual incidents in Hall of Famer Cyril Birge’s officiating career happened at the 1956 semi-state at Lafayette, when Lafayette beat Gary. “I worked the game, and afterwards the (Gary) people wanted to secede from Indiana and join Illinois,” Cyril said, laughing, in an interview with Jack Schneider in 1987. “There was a little stink. We had a rough time up there. I fouled out a couple (Gary) kids, threw them out, for really clobbering underneath the basket. They were taking (opponents) out, like clipping in football. We had a few cops walking with us down to the dressing room. When Commissioner Phillips heard about it, after it came out in the papers that (they) wanted to secede to Illinois, he just told me, that might not be a bad idea.”

Cyril’s high school officiating caught the eye of Indiana University coach Branch McCracken, a two-time national champion. “I found out (Branch) was instrumental, went to bat for me in the Big 10,” said Cyril, who landed a prestigious Big 10 job in 1959 that ran until his 1971 retirement.

In later years Cyril was often asked if he had any trouble with IU basketball coach Bob Knight, a three-time national champion known for berating officials. “No,” he said, laughing, “Bobby Knight never gave me any problems. Those people didn’t realize he was a player at that time (Cyril retired before Knight coached IU). When I worked at Ohio State, Bobby Knight was on the bench as the sixth man. They had Havlicek, Lucas, and Siegfried. Every time I went up and down the floor Bobby Knight was just as calm as he could be.”   

In 1967, just as in the 1954 Milan state championship win, Cyril was on the grand stage again. UCLA, ranked number one and undefeated, played Illinois at Chicago Stadium. UCLA was led by two basketball giants – sophomore sensation Lew Alcindor (later Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) and coach John Wooden. They were in the midst of an undefeated season and the third of Wooden’s 10 national championship teams.

Cyril said that matchup was the most memorable college game he worked. He took some of his children along on the train ride to Chicago. A huge snowstorm canceled the Friday game. No taxis were available, so the Birges luckily snared a ride to their hotel on a newspaper delivery truck. The game was finally played on Sunday. “That’s when Lew Alcindor set the scoring record of 45 points in Chicago Stadium,” said Cyril. “I also called at least four or five goal tending calls on him, I’m sure. But he’d always say, ‘Mr. Birge.’ They asked me to present him with the game ball, so when they took him out, I gave him the ball.” The Chicago Tribune took a picture of Cyril presenting the ball to Alcindor (Jabbar), with Coach Wooden also visible. The photo ran in newspapers across the country. The Tribune sent a copy of the photo to Cyril, which he kept displayed at his employer, Gus Doerner’s sporting goods store in Jasper, and then on his living room wall. Cyril’s son, Bob, had the photo signed in later years by his father, Jabbar, and Wooden. The picture is now at the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in New Castle.

Bob Birge attended UCLA from 1979 to 1981, where he introduced himself to Wooden as Cyril’s son. He made it a point to talk to Wooden when their paths crossed later, either at UCLA games, at the Wooden Classic at the fieldhouse in Indianapolis, or at Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame events.

Bob said that Wooden, a 1932 Purdue graduate and a three-time basketball All-American, knew of his dad as a 1934 Jasper senior recruited to play at Purdue. Both subsequently played against each other in semi-pro basketball in the 1930s, Cyril for the Jasper Coca-Colas team and Wooden for the Indianapolis Kautskys. Cyril also refereed some of the games Wooden coached at Indiana State from 1946 to 1948. Bob said that Wooden selected Cyril from the Big 10 referees’ list to work the UCLA game at Chicago in 1967.

“When I would visit with Coach Wooden, the first thing he would always say is how is dad doing?” said Bob. “He was always very complimentary of dad’s officiating, he would always tell me he was one of his favorite officials. They had a great relationship that lasted over time, from the 1930s to the early 2000s.” On one of his trips back to Indiana, Wooden had signed the Tribune photo, “For Cyril, with best wishes from one of the past, John Wooden, UCLA.”

Jabbar had signed the photo for Bob some years earlier, when Bob had a press pass to enter the Los Angeles Lakers’ dressing room in a game at Indianapolis.

“Jabbar knew that picture right away,” said Bob. “He said ‘I have this same picture, so that’s your dad?’” And he remembered that game, I think because of how unusual it would be to stop a game and give a game ball to a player.”

At the Jasper High School Athletic Hall of Fame inaugural induction banquet in 2022, Bob gave the induction speech about Cyril. He talked further about his dad’s connection with Wooden and Eddie Rottet.

“It was dad’s time as a Jasper Wildcat player that was nearest and dearest to him,” said Bob. “It was best described to me what type of player he really was . . . by Coach Wooden. . . . On several occasions he said to me, your dad was a better player than he was an official, and he was a darn good official. Coming from John Wooden, I think that was a pretty good testament to what kind of player he really was. . . . My dad was a very, very good player, but he would be the first to tell you that they had a superstar on that team, Eddie Rottet. He was a man among boys on the basketball floor and the baseball field. If they ever do a Mount Rushmore of Jasper athletes, it has to include Eddie Rottet. Eddie was truly (dad’s) best friend, and the star of that team. Cyril was going to Purdue to play, he had a full ride scholarship. Eddie Rottet was going to Northwestern, and he also had an opportunity with the Kansas City Blues to play professional baseball, that’s how good he really was. But it wasn’t meant to be for both of them. They got sick that summer . . .” Rottet died later that summer.

When Cyril died in 2008, his grandson, Joe Birge, said that the biggest bouquet of flowers at the funeral came from Wooden.

(In the next “Cat Tales” excerpt, coaches and players will talk about what made Cyril Birge such a highly-respected referee.)