It has been almost two and a half weeks since the DU hockey team captured their record-breaking 10th national championship in St. Paul, Minn., and the celebration tour has still not ended. In less than a month, the No. 5/6 men’s lacrosse team alongside the No. 12/14 women’s lacrosse team will make their chase for their respective titles.
It’s ring season in Denver and what better way to celebrate it than by examining how the student newspaper of the university has covered national championship victories? This week’s Into The Archives topic is just that.
Each week for the rest of the quarter, in celebration of the DU Clarion’s 125th anniversary, I will be siphoning through the archives located at the DU Special Collections to help showcase the great history of our newspaper. Let’s get into it.
March 31, 1961 (vol. 37, no. 40)
The first line of this short, short article reads “This is the greatest hockey team ever to represent an American college or university.” That line aged very well since its original claim after DU went back to back in 1960 and 1961.
If you are an NHL fan and know what the Bill Masterton Award is (given to the player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to hockey), the namesake for the noble award is the player in the middle (number 9).
Masterton played with DU for both national championships and held the DU points record for 25 years. Sadly, he passed away at age 29 after suffering a brain injury during a game with the NHL’s Minnesota North Stars, but his legacy forever remains with his award and DU greatness.
April 2, 1965 (vol. 69, no. 40)
Of course, any talk about DU national championships can not go without mentioning the record-breaking 24 skiing national championships. The article above is a slightly underwhelming account of DU’s win in 1965, the fifth consecutive year DU won the title. DU won this title at Crystal Mountain in Washington and was led by their legendary head coach Willy Schaeffler. Schaeffler led the Crimson and Gold to 14 of the 24 total national championships and was inducted into the US Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame.
The only year DU did not win the title in the 1960s was in 1968. It’s the most dominated decade in NCAA skiing and it might be one of the greatest collegiate reigns across NCAA history.
May 25, 2015 (Website)
I know this is not a print edition article, but I wanted to highlight the other sport responsible for bringing home a national championship. The article comes from some of the first to be published under the lacrosse section on the Clarion website. In 2015, Denver became the first school west of the Mississippi to win a lacrosse national championship, and the Clarion covered the feat through several articles.
The author of the article is listed as Henry Hargrave, but I am certain the previous Sports Editor before me did not attend school in 2015, so if you are reading this and know who wrote this article, please let me know. I would love to give the proper credit.
