{"id":91429,"date":"2015-03-06T12:39:49","date_gmt":"2015-03-06T17:39:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=91429"},"modified":"2016-01-05T13:22:48","modified_gmt":"2016-01-05T18:22:48","slug":"sutherland-bates-ncaa-1961","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2015\/03\/06\/sutherland-bates-ncaa-1961\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering the big center Jim Sutherland ’61 and the Bobcats’ NCAA tourney team of 1961"},"content":{"rendered":"

When it comes to Bates men’s basketball and rebounding, the name “Jim Sutherland ’61” is the only one you need to know.<\/p>\n

Sutherland owns all Bates rebounding records: most in a game (37), most in a season (418), most in a career (1,002) and highest average during a season (16.7).<\/p>\n

As the 2015 Bates men’s team gets ready for its first-round game in the NCAA Division III Basketball Championship<\/a> at 5:30 p.m. today, the alumni who played on Bates’ first NCAA tournament team, in 1961, remember Sutherland, who passed away in 1996, as a big man in more than one respect.<\/p>\n

\"edit-620-B-127\"<\/a>

At right, No. 52 Jim Sutherland ’61 gets into position to do what he did best, rebound, as Jerry Feld ’60 takes a shot vs. Maine during the 1960 season. (An earlier version of this story misidentified Feld as Chick Harte ’64, and the year as 1961.) (Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)<\/p><\/div>\n

“Jim was the moral leader of that team,” says W. Scott Brown ’61. “Nobody worked harder and was more self-effacing.”<\/p>\n

A center, Sutherland was a big man at six-foot-seven, but he could jump, at least according to the standard of the day.<\/p>\n

As The Bates Student<\/em> reported, Sutherland had a breakaway vs. Northeastern, and rather than score with a layup, he fulfilled a “personal ambition” and “executed a ‘dunk.'” (Yes, “dunk” was in quotation marks in the original story.)<\/p>\n

Early in the season, the Bobcats beat a much taller University of New Hampshire, 97-91, with Sutherland pouring in 42 points.<\/p>\n

He was no less effective on the other side of the court. “Defensively, he owned every center he went up against. He shut down Colby’s Ed Marchetti repeatedly over three years,” says Brown.<\/p>\n

Against Clark, he hauled in 37 rebounds to set the record that still stands.<\/p>\n

\"web-fisk-620-B-029\"<\/a>

Guard Peter Fisk ’62 got hot in the Bobcats’ NCAA tournament game vs. Springfield, scoring 25 points. (Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)<\/p><\/div>\n

Bates was selected to the 1961 NCAA College Division Tournament, forerunner of today’s Division III Championship, after winning its final four games, two in overtime, including the season finale against Colby in which Sutherland had 33 rebounds.<\/p>\n

The Bobcats faced host Springfield in the first round.<\/p>\n

It was something of a grudge match because Bates had beaten the Gymnasts (their nickhame back then; the Pride now) by a score of 68-64 during the season. Springfield, however, publicly insisted that bad scouting was the reason for the loss.<\/p>\n

But Bates won again, 75-63, as guard Peter Fisk ’62 got hot, scoring 25 points. He was named to the All-Tourney team.<\/p>\n

Bates was behind 30-29 at halftime but, according to The Bates Student<\/em> report, the Bobcats “swished the cords on 17 out of 24 attempts” in the second half to pull away.<\/p>\n

Bob Zering ’62 came off the bench in the first half to score a quick six points, including a “long one hander and canned four free throws in four attempts,” according to the Student.<\/em><\/p>\n

“The Springfield press was amazed at the sharpshooting Bobcats,” Zering recalls today.<\/p>\n

Bates faced Williams in the regional final, with Williams coming out on top, 75-68.<\/p>\n

After Sutherland passed away, Brown attended his teammate’s funeral in New Hampshire, and recalls that “it seemed like the whole state turned out. He was a great human being.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When it comes to Bates men’s basketball and rebounding, the name “Jim…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":104,"featured_media":91432,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-91429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-batesnews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/104"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91429"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":91485,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91429\/revisions\/91485"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}