For the first time in 23 years, the Vandals were Northern Division champions of the PCC,[1]22–9 overall in the regular season and 11–5 in conference play.[2][3] In the last game of the regular season, the Vandals defeated Palouse neighbor Washington State by two points in Moscow,[2] and Oregon took down runner-up Oregon State by a point in overtime on the road in Corvallis.[4]
In the four-game series with each, the Vandals split with both Oregon and Oregon State, took three from Washington, and swept Washington State.
Idaho met Southern Division champion California in the best-of-three championship series in Berkeley,[5] lost game one in a near-riot,[6][7] won game two,[8][9] but lost the third.[10][11][12]
*Non-conference game. (#) Tournament seedings in parentheses. All times are in Pacific time.
Fatal accident
Earlier in the season on December 21, player Ronnie White (age 21) and student manager Walter Thomas (age 18) were killed in a midday automobile accident in southern Idaho, near Wendell. Also injured were players Warren Shepherd, George Weitz, and Bob Fuller, the latter two hospitalized. The five were traveling in a panel truck driven by Thomas from Rupert to Boise when it collided head-on with a larger truck loaded with concrete pipe on a snow-covered curve; the other driver was not injured.[13][14][15][16]
Alumnus Guy Wicks returned to the university after serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II and resumed his duties as head coach in basketball (and baseball); Brown was the acting athletic director during the war and also the head football coach in 1945 and 1946.
The next title in basketball for Idaho was 35 years away, in 1981 in the Big Sky Conference.
