LITTLE ROCK — A short-term moniker with an extraordinarily long life, the “Triplets” will be reunited Nov. 5.
Honoring Marvin Delph is simply poetic justice, according to one of the members on the committee that selected the latest group of University of Arkansas athletes to join the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame.
Forty years ago, NBC’s Al McGuire hung the label on Delph, Sidney Moncrief and Ron Brewer when Arkansas defeated Cal State-Fullerton in the NCAA Regional Final to advance to the Final Four in St. Louis. Describing the play of those three homegrown products, going with “Triplets” is much more efficient than quoting Aristotle as saying, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”
“No coach has ever been as blessed to have three guys all 6-4 on the same team that could play like they could,” former Arkansas coach Eddie Sutton told an Oklahoma reporter more than 20 years ago. “Any one of them could have led the nation in scoring … Yet those guys were team players.”
He went so far as to say that a small state like Arkansas might never against produce three such talented players at the same time. Moncrief from Little Rock was inducted in the SWC Hall in 2014 and Brewer from Fort Smith was recognized last year. A prolific shooter from outside, Delph “might have averaged 40 points a game,” Sutton said, and the star from Conway played almost a decade before the 3-point shot became part of the college game.
Instead of one of the three demanding star status, they shared:
—Delph made 56 percent of his 452 shots and averaged 16.8 points.
—Moncrief was good on 59 percent of his 354 field goal attempts and averaged 17.3.
—Brewer hit 53 percent of his 486 shots and averaged 18.0.
Oddly, Moncrief wrote in his autobiography that he and the others never thought of themselves as a particular group and that the “Triplets” moniker was mostly a media thing.
On March 16, 1978, the date Arkansas gained instant credibility nationally by beating 10-time NCAA champion and No. 2 UCLA, the trio made 23 of 41 field goal attempts and scored 62 points in the 74-70 victory.
Also to be inducted into the SWC Hall at a Little Rock Touchdown Club function in November are football players Glen Ray Hines, Bobby Crockett, Jimmy Walker and Gary Anderson; long-distance runner Rueben Reina; baseball player Tim Lollar; basketball player Tracy Webb; and tennis player Peter Doohan.
Hines was a consensus All-American in 1965 while Crockett and Walker were FWAA All-Americans, and Anderson was the 20th pick in the 1983 NFL Draft. Those four make 29 Razorback football players in the SWC Hall and most of them played under Frank Broyles when the Arkansas program was one of the best in the country.
Limited on space, accomplishments of the new members of the SWC Hall are available online.
Former Arkansas quarterback Bill Montgomery instigated the move to dramatically improve the UA’s representation in the SWC Hall.
Before he got involved, UT held a 40-something to 2 lead over the UA as far as members in the Hall and, even then, former Razorbacks Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson were in because of their relationship to the Dallas Cowboys and not the UA athletic program. Like dozens of others, they were members of the Texas Sports Hall of Fame who were grandfathered into the SWC Hall of Honor when the Texas Hall took over the operation.
Montgomery organized a committee to help with the selection process and his push for true UA representation in the SWC Hall began with the October 2013 induction of former coach/athletics director Broyles. During the next year, former basketball coach Nolan Richardson and former track coach John McDonnell were inducted in ceremonies in Texas.
The November 2014 induction of Sutton, Lance Alworth, Clyde Scott, Loyd Phillips, Leotis Harris and Billy Moore from football; Moncrief; Mike Conley from track; and Melody Sye from track in Little Rock was supposed to be the first phase of a three-step process to add about two dozen UA representatives.
Instead, more than 30 Arkansas athletes were added during the next three years, including Wear Schoonover from the 1920s and Jim Benton from the 1930s.
In addition to the large groups inducted in Little Rock, a committee has selected one person from Arkansas to join a representative from each of the other SWC schools in an annual induction ceremony in Texas. Steve Atwater was inducted into the hall last month.
Arkansans in Southwest Conference Hall of Fame
Football: Lance Alworth, Gary Anderson, Steve Atwater, Jim Benton, Frank Broyles, Dick Bumpas, Bill Burnett, Ronnie Caveness, Bobby Crockett, Chuck Dicus, Joe Ferguson, Quinn Grovey, Dan Hampton, Leotis Harris, Wayne Harris, Ken Hatfield, Glen Ray Hines, Steve Little, Fred Marshall, Wayne Martin, Bill Montgomery, Billy Moore, Loyd Phillips, Cliff Powell, Wear Schoonover, Clyde Scott, Billy Ray Smith Sr., Billy Ray Smith Jr., Jimmy Walker
Men's Basketball: Ron Brewer, Todd Day, Marvin Delph, Joe Kleine, Lee Mayberry, Sidney Moncrief, Nolan Richardson, Eddie Sutton, Darrell Walker
Women's Basketball: Bettye Fiscus, Amber Shirey, Tracy Webb
Baseball: Norm DeBriyn, Tim Lollar, Kevin McReynolds
Men's Track & Field: Mike Conley, Joe Falcon, Edrick Floreal, John McDonnell, Frank O'Mara, Niall O'Shaughnessy, Reuben Reina
Women's Track & Field: Bev Lewis, Cynthia Moore, Melody Sye
Men's Tennis: Peter Doohan
Men's Golf: R.H. Sikes
Journalist: Orville Henry