Clyde Mayes went to Wade Hampton HS***

in his home town in Mississippi on March 2022 of cancer but had a pretty dang good career coaching at JAX U, FURMAN & FSU.

In his last year at JAX (1970) he took team to the Natty game against Wooden & UCLA before losing 80-69 with his sharp-shooter Artis Gilmore. See pic of him & John Wooden pre-game.

That getting to the Natty game landed him the HC gig at Furman from 1970-1978 where I saw & watched his good teams that went to 5 NCAA tournaments and where he became their best ever basketball coach to date as well as being inducted into Paladins HoF in1996.

His most famous player at Furman was Clyde Mayes (of Greenville High) and together they beat Gamecocks 75-67 at Philly in a NCAA game and finished 22-9.

He led all 3 of his teams to NCAA tournament play which only 25 coaches have done.

His overall record is 336-231 and at Furman he was 142-87.

Joe was flamboyant since he dressed in wild colored combinations, like: Purple coat, white tie, white shoes.

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Found a great article about Joe and that magical run Jacksonville had in 1970.

Feb 9, 2024, 6:48 AM

When college hoops had Maravich, UCLA and Jacksonville

Earlier this week when I talked with former Furman coach Joe Williams, it took me back to 1970, which was a magical year in college basketball, still years away from a shot clock and 3-point line.

Pete Maravich and his gray, floppy socks averaged slightly more than 44 points a game for LSU.

UCLA was without Lew Alcindor (he became Kareem Abdul Jabbar in 1974) for the first time in three years but wasn't missing a beat, still the best team in the college world with Sidney Wicks and Curtis Rowe leading the way.

And then there was Jacksonville.

The Dolphins were coached by Williams, a smooth talker who left Furman as an assistant and went to the Florida school in 1964. He silently built a winner and by 1969 Williams had a power.

His team was led by Artis Gilmore, a 7-foot-2 center who averaged 26.5 points and 22 rebounds a game, and Rex Morgan, a sharpshooting 6-5 guard who dished out nearly 9 assists per game while averaging 18 points. The Dolphins also had another 7-footer in Pembrook Burrows III, who went from playing sparingly in high school to averaging 11 points per game for Jacksonville, which routinely scored 100 or more points per game.

Gilmore, now in the National basketball Hall of Fame, played two season at Gardner-Webb in Boiling Springs when the school was a junior college. During the 1969-70 season he led Jacksonville to a 23-1 regular-season record and a berth in the NCAA tournament, which had a field of just 25 teams.

The Dolphins were placed in the powerful Mideast regional along with Iowa, Kentucky, Notre Dame, Ohio and Western Kentucky, all teams that could light it up. The team that won every game in the regional scored 100 or more points. In the first round Notre Dame's Austin Carr set an NCAA record with 61 points in a 102-82 win over Ohio.

Six of the nine games in which the winning team scored more than 100 were played in the Mideast. Iowa won the region's consolation game in a 121-106 track meet over Notre Dame.

Jacksonville won its first game over Western Kentucky 109-96 and then faced Iowa. The Hawkeyes featured guard Fred Brown and forward Johnny Johnson, players from the playgrounds of Milwaukee who would become teammates in the pro ranks and lead Seattle to an NBA title in 1979.

In the regional semifinals the Dolphins upset Iowa 104-103 on a tip-in by Burrows at the buzzer.

In the finals Jacksonville, with an enrollment of 2,700, beat Kentucky 106-100 to earn a trip to the Final Four.

"I've always said to be a good coach you need great players and that was a really good group," Williams recalled.

In the semifinals UCLA easily beat New Mexico State 93-77 while Jacksonville advanced with a 91-83 win over St. Bonaventure, which was playing with All-American center Bob Lanier, who tore ligaments in his ankle a week earlier and missed the Final Four.

The final, which then was still a Saturday game, was played in College Park, Maryland. The Dolphins started well and led 22-13 after 11 minutes but the Bruins made adjustments, took control late in the first half and cruised to an 80-69 win for their fourth straight title and sixth in eight years.

Williams left Jacksonville after that season and returned to Furman, where he led his team to five NCAA appearances in eight seasons.

Williams said he tries to make it to the Final Four every year where he can catch up with old friends.

"We try and make it a thing where we get together with Lefty Driesell, Denny Crum, Wimp Sanderson and Jerry Tarkanian used to be with us," he said of the former UNLV coach who died last month.

"We get together at a really good restaurant with our wives and talk about how great we used to be."

And in 1970, the college hoops scene was really, really good.

https://www.citizen-times.com/story/sports/2015/03/12/college-hoops-maravich-ucla-jacksonville/70212718/

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Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Re: Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Re: Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Remember him well, I went to a lot of FU games in the 70s. They were giant

Re: Remember him well, I went to a lot of FU games in the 70s. They were giant

Common name, but isn't he the same Joe Williams...

Hey bretfsu..sir, please my article again and see that

Re: Common name, but isn't he the same Joe Williams...

Re: Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Re: Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Re: Remember Furman BB HC Coach JOE Williams? He died @ 88

Artis Gilmore wasn't exactly a "sharpshooter". He was a seven-footer who was

Found a great article about Joe and that magical run Jacksonville had in 1970.

Fiurman was a very very good basketball school even before this.....

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