USC Game

Above: studends flocked to the rooftops of dorms in order to watch the USC vs. Trinity tennis match.

perhaps the biggest game of the season was when USC flew out to San Antonio to play Trinity. This was extremely significant because USC rarely left their home court let alone to come out to Texas. The 1972 Mirage issue describes how the associated press compared the USC versus. Trinity match to the “Super Bowl of College Tennis.” Conferring to The Trinitonian March 17^th issue, the USC game was hyped up so much that by the time game day came around, there was a crowd of two thousand people. Fans gathered around campus and watched from atop the library, Murchison dormitory, and around the tennis stadium. The hype was real as Trinity was the number one ranked team and USC was the number two-ranked team so this match had every indication for a historical game in the making. Clarence Mabry said that ‘“Getting USC to come play us on our home court is the biggest scheduling ‘breakthrough’ we’ve ever made here at Trinity. The match has the makings for the best ever to be played here in the Alamo City”’ (The Trinitonian March 17, 1972). When the match began, spectators could be spotted from every corner of campus. Stockton said that this was the biggest crowd he’s ever played in front of and having that crowd support him and his teammates gave comfort to him and his teammates knowing that they had people on their side that cared and wanted to see them win (personal interview). As the game went on, both Dick and Brian lost their matches (The Trinitonian April 24). However, since Trinity had such good depth, the number five player Pancho Walthall and number six player won both of their matches giving Trinity the late and final lead of 6-3. The USC game represents the testament of the 1972 tennis team player depth. The overall impact of the USC game suggests that no matter what sort of adversity this team faced, they always seemed to overcome it. When star player Stockton lost his match, his teammates stepped up for him. This demonstrated the teams overall capability as a whole and suggests that the team did not rely on one player, rather it relied on the teams capacity to rally together. Overall, although the USC game was not the championship game, it further validated the view that Trinity was the favorite to win the championship in the very near future with really no team standing a chance against the Trinity powerhouse.