Big 32 finale a game for the ages

 On Saturday, March 15, 1969, 10,700 fans packed the Montana State University Fieldhouse, as it was known then, to watch the Big 32 boys  basketball championship game and the last Big 32 game ever played. 

The attendance for that game and the same attendance for the semifinal round the night before remain the largest crowds to ever watch any Treasure State basketball games.

Those who got inside on the last night — about 500 people were turned away due to fire safety regulations — were treated to a classic. They saw Laurel defeat Flathead 57-54 in overtime to capture the championship.

Laurel finished 26-0, and the Don Peterson-coached Locomotives tacked on four more wins the next season to extend their winning streak to 30 games. 

Flathead finished with a sterling 22-4 record and won the 1970 state AA championship.

If ever there were a David vs. Goliath matchup, Laurel vs. Kalispell was it. Laurel had 431 students at the start of the 1968-69 school year, compared with Kalispell’s enrollment that was more than three times larger, 1,378 students.

Kalispell wasn’t the only large school the Locomotives defeated that year. They edged Billings Senior (nearly 2,000 students) at the Broncs’ gym and easily beat Bozeman (902 students) twice during the regular season. They outlasted Great Falls Russell (about 1,700 students) at the Rustlers’ gym to win the divisional championship. And they opened state tournament play by whipping Missoula Hellgate (more than 1,700 students).

Kalispell also had a decided height advantage over Laurel. The Braves’ front line included 6-foot-11 all-stater Brent Wilson, 6-7 Don Groven and 6-4 Greg Ellingson.

The Locomotives answered with quickness, an outstanding matchup zone defense and, on occasion, a full-court press. Those traits helped overcome the fact that no starter on Laurel’s senior-dominated team was taller than its 6-2 stalwarts, smooth-shooting all-state forward Tom Perrigo and steady rebounder Jerry Bygren.

The Locomotives had reached the previous three Big 32 state tournaments, but the addition of senior guard Alan Campbell put them on top in 1969. Campbell, one of the finest playmakers in Montana prep history, earned all-state honors at Billings Central as a junior before transferring to archrival Laurel for his senior year. 

One unforgettable memory is the almost-deafening cheers for the Locomotives from the packed arena. Besides apparently everyone living in Laurel, the Locomotives seemed to have nearly everybody else on their side. Their support certainly dwarfed that provided by the smaller section of Kalispell fans.

When the final buzzer sounded, Wilson was shaking his head in disbelief at the outcome. Laurel had double- and triple-teamed him — sometimes putting even four players on him, daring the Braves to try scoring from outside. The tactic worked, despite Kalispell’s rebounding advantage. It didn’t help the Braves’ cause that Wilson and Groven fouled out late in regulation play.

With less than a minute remaining in the fourth quarter and the score tied at 53, Laurel, trying for a final shot, lost the ball when Campbell was called for traveling. Braves forward Jim Otten, however, misfired on a long jumper. 

Conversing recently from his home in Arizona, Wilson recalled the lasting what-might-have-been for the Braves and their fans.

“I somehow got it, turned and sawGreg Ellingson standing under the basket. He looked up, the ball hit him in the hands and bounced out of bounds.”

 Wilson then got called for his fifth foul. That sent Perrigo to the line for a one-and-one with two seconds left in regulation play, but Perrigo missed the first shot, preserving the tie.

In overtime, Bygren sank two free throws to give Laurel a 55-53 lead. Both teams squandered subsequent opportunities, Ellingson and Perrigo missing free throws before Ellingson sank a charity shot to make it 55-54. Seconds later, the Locomotives put together the play that iced their win.

Peterson called a timeout with about a minute left and positioned the Locomotives in a four-corner offense. The tactic required discipline and the patience to wait for a good shot.

The play paid off, thanks to the other Perrigo on the Locomotives’ roster, Tom’s 5-8 cousin, Lee, a tansfer from Worland, Wyo., at the start of his senior year. He retired last October from the Cenex refinery after 37 years employment there. Interviewed at his home in Laurel in February, Perrigo said he remembered seeing the four-corner scheme made famous by North Carolina coach Dean Smith on TV.

“We had not used it (in a game), but we had practiced it.”

“In that four corners, if somebody leaves you, you cut to the basket. I cut to the basket just like I was taught. I got the ball back and scored on a layup. They were the last points scored in the Big 32,” he said.

Lee Perrigo’s bucket made it 57-54. Kalispell’s Gary Stoick missed a 20-footer and, although Laurel got the rebound, the Braves regained possession with nine seconds left. They couldn’t get a shot off, however, and the Locomotives reigned over the Big 32.

“It was a good game, but we threw it away,” a slightly rueful Wilson said almost 45 years later.

Later that night, the lights went out — in the fieldhouse and on a remarkable era in Montana sports. But not without something else for the record books. According to a 1984 book “Quest for the State Championship” by former Flathead Braves player Dan Bain, attendance at the 1969 Big 32 tournament was 41,000. That was then, and probably still remains, the all-time attendance record for a state tournament.

And it’s a measure of how popular the Big 32 was with fans around the state, many of whom embraced two great Class A teams at the 1969 tourney: defending champion Wolf Point and the Cinderella state champion Locomotives. 

 Dennis Gaub is the author of “Dream Season: How the little Laurel Locomotives steamed to an unbeaten season and captured a historic Montana basketball championship.” He can be reached at montanawordsmith@gmail.com.