That Championship Season: Roosevelt Celebrates 1965 Basketball Team
Members of the 1965 Roosevelt High School basketball team were honored on the 50th anniversary of their state championship.
Friday afternoon and evening they turned back the clock fifty years at Roosevelt High School. A pep assembly in the school auditorium and a halftime ceremony in the gym were staged to honor the boys’ basketball team that won the state championship in 1965.
That team was an offensive juggernaut that set more than one record while cruising past three opponents during the state tournament at old Veterans Auditorium. Keep in mind that those were days when no basket counted for more than two points no matter how far away it was launched. Still, Coach Al Comito’s freewheeling, full court-pressing bunch topped the 80 point mark 16 times over the course of 26 total games.
The TRHS school spirit was an even more powerful force. The student section’s refusal to sit down (“Stand up and cheer for dear old Roosevelt,” says the school fight song, after all) during the state tourney games at Vets was a point of pride (“No, the Roosevelt cheering section will not be seated” reads the caption of a yearbook photo from the state semifinal matchup with Keokuk). So was the caravan of several hundred cars that wound its way through town like a blue and white train the day after the title game honking out the news that Roosevelt was the home of the state champs just in case anybody hadn’t heard.
Tom Kreamer was a lanky frontcourt star who got a scholarship to Iowa State and became an attorney who lives and practices in Kansas City. His running mate, Tom Schulze, went on to play for the Iowa team that won the Big Ten title in 1969-70. Old timers remember Des Moines Register headlines with a recurring “Tom-Tom” theme as Kreamer and Schulze paced the ‘65 team’s march to glory.
“The state basketball championship did strange things to Roosevelt. In addition to disrupting study for a time, it created a feeling of unity and pride which is unimaginable to anyone who has not actually experienced it.” – 1965 yearbook (page 127)
Schulze was tragically killed in 1985 but only two of the surviving members of the team were absent from Friday’s festivities The co-captains were Ron Shirk (Dr. Ron Shirk whose patients over the years have included former teammates and coaches) and Kreamer. Coach Comito, Kreamer and Schulze are all members of the Iowa High School Basketball Hall of Fame. A short video clip from the title game was shown at the assembly. It highlighted how hair and shorts have lengthened over the years but hardly did the team justice. Afterwards Kreamer spoke on behalf of the team.
“Well, I’m sure after watching that and looking at us old guys you’re probably wondering how we ever won anything,” he joked. “But even though we don’t have the skills anymore to win a basketball championship, let me tell you what we do have. We have memories, like the all-day assembly in this auditorium on Monday after we won state. And a deep love for Roosevelt. All of us are still proud to tell people that we graduated from one of the best high schools in America, one known for excellence in everything – academics, athletics and fine arts.”
All 13 players on that storied team earned college degrees.
Prior to the assembly the guests of honor shared lunch and a building tour with the current boys’ varsity team. Gifts were exchanged. This year’s team gave the returning champs school t-shirts and caps. The champs reciprocated with school-colored socks like the ones that were all the rage at Roosevelt back in 1965.
The team wore them Friday night when they took the court against North but there was no magic in them. The Polar Bears spoiled the party by winning the boys’ game after the Roosevelt girls triumphed in the opener. That didn’t prevent a halftime ceremony when Des Moines Mayor Frank Cownie, TRHS Class of ’66, presented the home-comers with a key to the city.
“You better make quick use of it after the game tonight,” he quipped, “because it expires at midnight.” There’s no expiration, though, where the exploits of that once-in-a-school’s-lifetime team are concerned.
The legendary Maury John was the Drake University head basketball coach at the time and he was quoted to the effect that Roosevelt was the best high school basketball team he’d ever seen.
He spoke for many who were around during that sensational winter half a century ago when a dozen Westside kids and a couple thousand of their closest friends were unstoppable together.
