Jim Jarvis on Being a Part of Juggernaut 1965 USA Team, ABA, and One of the Hardest Fouls in Pro Hoops History

Fresh off the 1964 Olympics, Team USA again showed its basketball might to the International stage with one of the best amateur rosters ever assembled. Competing for the first time in the World University Games, the roster boasted five future All-Stars, three future Hall of Famers, and over 80 years of future pro experience.

The World University Games, also known as the Summer Universiade, was formed in 1959 by FISU to showcase international collegiate talent in competition. While the US had fielded its collegiate talent at the Summer Olympics ever since its designation as an official Olympic event in 1936, it had passed on sending a team to the World University Games due to political concerns.

That was until 1965 at least, when the US assembled an elite team of some of the best college stars around the nation to compete in Budapest. The team was coached by Hall of Famer John Kundla and captained by Hall of Famer Bill Bradley who won his first Gold Medal in the Olympics the year prior. The roster also featured Hall of Famers Billy Cunningham and Lou Hudson, NBA All-Stars Tom and Dick Van Arsdale, and future pros John Austin, Bill Buntin, Joe Ellis, Fred Hetzel, Jim Jarvis, Ollie Johnson, and Floyd Theard.

Stats from the 1965 World University Games, curtesy of USA Basketball

The US squad went on to go undefeated in the event, winning all eight games with an average margin of victory of a whopping thirty six points.

The following features the words of Mr. Jim Jarvis who was generous enough to talk over the phone regarding his experience being a starter on the team, and his later experience playing in the ABA. The audio of both conversations can be listened to below.

What was the selection process like?

“You know, I don’t know exactly how that was done. At that point in time, the racial thing was still there, we were six white guys and six black guys. They were all good guys, but I’m sure there were some black guards who were as good or better as I was that were overlooked.”

Did anyone’s future potential stand out to you?

“I was fortunate enough to play and start in almost all of those games so I played with all of them and it’d be pretty hard to single out anybody. You’re talking about Billy Cunningham, Bill Bradley, Lou Hudson, and others. They’re all great players and I don’t think there was a selfish one amongst us. We all played well as a team, and that was inspiring to me.”

Was the games being played outdoors challenging in any aspect?

“Yes it was, and my memory was that we used rubber basketballs which were obviously a little different than the leather balls.”

Every game aside the finals was played outdoors, which was moved inside due to rain.

“The first time we played the Russians we beat them by like forty points. We came through undefeated until we played them in the championship game. I broke my foot in the first two minutes of the game, so I wasn’t much of a participant myself. This was held in Budapest obviously and the anxiety there and the real dislike of the Russians was unbelievable. When they announced us as the gold medal winner, the whole crowd stood up and cheered for five minutes solid. When the Russians were introduced as the silver medal winner, they were faking their clapping and it was dead silent”

Was there any particular memory of the event that was your favorite?

“The whole experience, because we were gone for like six weeks. I had gotten married and just had a baby son my senior year so being gone for six weeks was a little tough for me.. What was interesting to me from a political standpoint was that they were very protective of us. We had went to the Scandinavian countries first, then Sweden, Finland, and Czechoslovakia. We pretty much stayed in hotels, they didn’t put us with families so that we could be acquainted with another culture. That was a little bit disappointing to me that they didn’t do that”

So it wasn’t an Olympic Village sort of thing where you were around the other athletes either?

“Ya we were separated. In fact we were staying in what was called the Budapest Youth Hostel, like a hotel, but I remember sitting in the lobby one morning and somebody came up with the paper. It was when the Watts riots broke out.. It had to be an interesting thing to the Hungarians since it was basically a racial thing in the paper and here we were, six blacks and six whites, walking the streets together..”

Jarvis was drafted 45th overall by San Francisco three months prior, but missed the Warriors training camp in 1965 due to his injury suffered in the championship of the World University Games. After a brief stint playing minor league baseball, he made his pro debut in 1967 with the Pittsburgh Pipers which went on to win the first ever ABA Championship. With the Pipers Jarvis was first off the bench and had a handful of big moments, including 18 points on 7-12 shooting to help keep the Pipers season alive in Game 6 of the Finals.

On December 2nd 1968, Jarvis was traded to the LA Stars and was later involved in an now infamous and highly dangerous incident with Warren Jabali, who went by Armstrong at the time. On January 22nd 1969, the Oaks had traveled to LA fresh off a sixteen game win streak. In the early minutes of the second quarter, Jarvis stole the ball from Jabali. An enraged Jabali then struck Jarvis from behind, sending him to the floor, and proceeded to stomp on his head. Jarvis was left seriously injured and Jabali was ejected from the game, ultimately handed a 15 game suspension with a fine of $250.

Photo 1: Jarvis, standing sixth from the left and the 68-69 LA Stars. Photo 2: Armstrong, kneeling fifth from the left and the 68-69 Oakland Oaks.

Jarvis’s recollection of the incident:

“It was a weird deal. One of my former teammates from Pittsburgh was on the Oakland team and after Armstrong stomped on me, momentum carrying past me, ran out and grabbed him to keep him from getting me again. I was fortunate that he was there to do that. I was hurt bad. I half conscious crawled out and collapsed. He was ejected obviously. Then Bill Sharman and the trainer ran out and told me not to move and that I may have a broken neck. The team doctor then came out and said I had to get ready for the second half! He took me to the training room, laid me on the table, washed and shaved my eyebrows off.”

“So after the game, I came out of the dressing room and some of the wives and girlfriends were standing out there and I began to talk to them. Armstrong came out of his dressing room and as he was walking by he says ‘well I’ll tell you one thing you sure are an ugly motherf****r now’.. nice guy”

Jabali was interviewed in 2005 about the incident, and his description of events was that you were harassing and hacking him trying to steal the ball, and in his frustration because no foul was called he impulsively swung on you and stomped you.

“Well years later, him and Connie Hawkins and one of my Pittsburgh teammates put on a clinic in Florida, and afterwards they went out for drinks. They all shared what they were most proud of in their life and what they were most ashamed of, and Armstrong shared that what he was most ashamed of was what he did to me.. So he made a turnaround of some kind I think”

In that interview by the way he did take responsibility for it and said there was no defense for what he did obviously.

“Well good, good, I’m glad to hear that”

So I’m assuming there was no long term ramifications for you because I saw that you played the next game and you scored 22 points?!

“Ha ha, that was in Denver. I flew in to Denver and went to the Dentist to get temporary help with my teeth. When I was playing that game I had the stitches across my eyebrows, my teeth were broken off, and my eyes were black! The fans were calling me a werewolf!”

Did you end up playing the Oaks again after he returned from his suspension?

“The last game we played was in Oakland. I had already filed a lawsuit against him and Oakland at the time was the headquarters of the black militants. There weren’t a lot of people there and when they played the national anthem they turned the lights off and I got next to the biggest black guy on the team because I was afraid someone was going to shoot me!”

Did you ever see footage of the Incident?

“You’re going to laugh at this. I filed the lawsuit and I later get a call from an attorney in LA saying he needed me down there next week because there was going to be a hearing in front of a judge. I had a colored film clip of the incident so I took that with me. I made a mistake because I used the team attorney who was obviously league affiliated.. not a smart deal for me.. I was sent up to the judges office with an old WW2 projector. They didn’t know how to run it… I really didn’t know how to run it, but I got it threaded and I ran it in front of the judge and I got to the point where he stomped on my head and the judge said ‘back it up, back it up!’ well the frame fell and melted!”

Audio of the full conversation with Jim Jarvis regarding the World University Games:

Audio of the full conversation regarding the ABA. Including a secret draft, Pittsburgh Pipers, Connie Hawkins, and more: