Midwest Regional Semifinal

Lubbock, Tex. (AP) Fourth-ranked Kansas turned back a spirited bid by Southern Methodist in Lubbock, TX to forge a 78-70 victory and join Texas Western in the finals of the NCAA Midwest Regional Basketball Tournament.

Texas Western, the nation's No. 3 club, swept into the finals with a dramatic 78-76 overtime triumph over seventh ranked Cincinnati.

Kansas and Texas Western clash Saturday night with a berth in the national tournament next weekend at College Park, Maryland riding on the outcome.

Kansas, the Big Eight champion, was heavily favored against its Southwest Conference opponent, but failed until the final moments to capture a commanding lead.

Midway through the final period, Southern Methodist seized a 58-57 lead, an advantage the Mustangs held only momentarily. From that moment, the Jayhawks, paced by big Walt Wesley with 23 points, methodically hammered ahead as they raced to their 10th straight triumph.

The Kansans are now 23-3. S.MU, which entered the game with 10 consecutive victories, carries a 16-9 mark into the consolation game Saturday night against Cincinnati.

The underdog Mustangs, led by Carl Hooser's 22 points, ripped into a seven point lead in the second half and seven times managed to even the count.

The lead changed hands 14 times. In addition to Wesley, three Jayhawks scored in double figures- Ron Franz, 19; Al Lopes, 11; and Jo Jo White, 10.

Charles Beasley contributed 17 for SMU and Bob Begert hit 12.

Texas Western played catchup all evening against Cincinnati and when the Miners did get the edge they came within a hair of losing it.

Cincinnati's John Howard attempted a desperation shot in the final seconds but the ball was short and to the left. Texas Western, trailing throughout the first half and most of the second, moved ahead for the first time with two minutes remaining.

David Lattin flipped in a layup to push the Miners into a 69-67 lead, but Don Rolfes forced the contest into overtime with a field goal 30 seconds later.

Lattin hit a total of 29 points for individual honors and drew major scoring support from teammate Bobby Joe Hill with 17 and Willie Cager with 11.

Roland West led the Bearcats, the Missouri Valley Conference champions, with 19 points, one more than Robb Krick.

Midwest Regional Final

Lubbock, Tex. (AP) Texas Western raced to a frantic 81-80 double overtime victory over Kansas Saturday night and won the Midwest regional of the NCAA basketball playoffs. The victory gave the third-ranked El Paso club a berth in the national tournament next weekend at College Park, Md.

Little Bobby Joe Hill, Texas Western's 5-9 playmaker, stole show from his taller colleagues in guiding the Miners to their 26th victory against one loss. Kansas, ranked fourth nationally, absorbed its fourth loss against 23 triumphs.

Regulation play ended with the score deadlocked at 69-69 and the first extra session closed at 71-71. Willie Cager's tip-in about one minute deep in the second overtime session pushed Texas Western in front 73-71 and they never relinquished the lead.

Hill led Texas Western's scoring with 22 points. Supporting Hill�s efforts were David Lattin with 15, Odesten Artis and Nevil Shed with 12 each and Harry Flournoy with 11.

Walt Wesley led the Jayhawk scoring with 24 points. Also scoring in double figures for Kansas were Jo Jo White with 19, Al Lopes 17, and Ron Franz 12.

Shed dumped a pair of charity shots a second after Cager's clutch two points, and in the chaotic final two minutes Artis hit a couple more to build the advantage to 77-71.

With a crowd of 8,200 screaming, Al Lopes spurred a dramatic Kansas comeback that was cut a point short by the clock.

Lopes pumped in three field goals and a free shot in the final 56 seconds. That would have pulled the contest from the fire except for a two-pointer by Cager with 32 seconds left.

It appeared that Kansas had triumphed with one second showing in the first overtime period. Jo Jo White looped in a 25-footer from the sidelines, but an official ruled he stepped out of bounds a moment before.

Hill, who also put on a dazzling defensive show, fired off a 25-footer in the final three seconds of the regulation game that would have shattered the 69-69 deadlock. It was inches off target.

National Championship Game

By Bob Ingram

El Paso Herald-Post

Everybody but Adolph Rupp calls the defense Kentucky used against Texas Western in the championship game of the NCAA tournament at College Park, Md., the one-three-one zone. It consists of one man out in front, three men strung out in a row near the key and one man in back.

The Kentucky coach insists it's a trap formation and not a zone defense. But the Miners did the trapping in their 72-65 win over the Wildcats from the Bluegrass State.

If they didn�t lull the Kentucky players into a sense of false security, they did everybody else, including the coaches and newspapermen at Maryland.

Nobody gave the Miners a chance to beat Kentucky, partly because the TWC team played a scrambling, clawing game that got them in serious foul trouble the night before against Utah. Although they defeated the Utes 85-78 with good utilization of their bench strength, the Miners didn't look impressive, especially on defense.

Kentucky was a six-point favorite in the championship. Every writer in the area picked the Wildcats to beat the Miners, So, did Jack Gardner, the Utah coach. Some said Kentucky would run the Miners off the court.

But against Kentucky, coyote calling Don Haskins got the defensive effort he wanted and it was Kentucky, not TWC, that got in foul trouble with a display of reaching, grabbing and other infractions. The Miners cashed in on the Wildcat fouls and won the game really at the free throw line, scoring 28 points to 11 for Kentucky.

Some of the optimism in the Kentucky camp may have rubbed off on the Wildcats. They may have figured they wouldn't have much trouble beating the Miners, particularly after they had whipped Duke the night before 83-78.

The Kentucky zone- or trap- did give the Miners a lot of trouble. It enables two men to surround the man with the ball in the corners or in the middle and puts so much pressure on him that he has trouble getting the ball away. It's particularly effective against the guards, and Bobby Joe Hill and Willie Worsley had their troubles with it. Each committed six errors. The Miners in all had 18 turnovers, a high for them during the whole season.

But the Kentucky trap also proved vulnerable and when the iron jaws of it failed to close, the Miners took advantage of that failure with some easy baskets. Although TWC scored five fewer field goals than Kentucky, the cheap or easy buckets they made contributed to their win.

To combat the Kentucky speed and defense, Haskins started Willie Worsley, the 5-6 guard, who is both fleet and can hit from a distance. He had Orsten Artis and Hill in the lineup, too. So, as a matter of fact, he used three guards, a high post man and a wingman. Worsley and Artis shot well from the outside. Willie Cager, at the high post, played one of his top games of the season and David Lattin, from the wing, jumped for five field goals and had a total of 16.

Harry Flournoy, who re-injured a knee the night before against Utah, played only six minutes of the finals. He was taken out grimacing with pain. Nevil Shed, Cager and Lattin took up the slack on the TWC inside defense and offense.

The depth of the TWC team was again demonstrated well. The Miners won despite one of their big men, Flournoy, sitting out 34 minutes of the game.

Hill was the driving force of the TWC offense, scoring seven fielders and six free throws for a total of 20. In a similar manner to his tactics in other games, he disrupted the Kentucky offense with his drive-in shots and he varied the spots in which he surged to the basket.

His two steals and layups with 10:06 and 9:56 left in the first half were the turning points in the game. Lattin followed with a dunk shot and Artis hit one from the corner. Those shots gave the Miners a lead they never relinquished.

At 7:11 to go, Hill came in under the left side of the basket for his famed "screw-shot." He appeared blocked, but made what was a second effort and twisted, away from a defensive man to make the basket with reverse English, it was called a "circus lay-up" by the play-by-play recorder. It may have been the little guard's most spectacular shot of the season- outside of that long fielder he made to give the Miners a two point win at Colorado State.

The Kentuckians got themselves into the one-and-one situation with 4:11 left in the first half, meaning the Miners could help themselves on bonus shots after they were fouled. This was big help to TWC.

Texas Western had an even better break in this respect in the second half. With 10 minutes gone, Kentucky committed its seventh team foul. The Miners were again in the position to cash in bonus free throws and that's just what they did. Kentucky did not reach that desired point until late in the game.

Pat Riley scored the first point of the game, a free throw with the game only 15 seconds old. Lattin followed with a three-pointer at 19:25 to give the Miners a two-point lead.

Kentucky came back got back into the lead on corner shots by Riley and Louie Dampier and were ahead by one when Hill made the first of his two big steals and layups.

The Miners were never tied or behind from then on throughout the game. They had two eight-point margins in the first half. In the second half a layup by Larry Conley with 17:37 left narrowed the Miners' lead to one. It was cut down to one again with a 20-footer by Dampier at 16:58 and 12:26. It was down to one after Tommy Kron tipped in a shot.

But Kentucky's effort to play catch-up failed. Texas Western had 11 point lead (68-57) on two free throws by Cager with 3:22 left.

They had leads of 10 points twice in the second half. And it was pretty apparent that the Miners had the game won with seven minutes left on the clock.