1985 Murray State men's basketball coaching staff [MSU Athletics photo]
Steve Newton was the Murray State basketball coach when the Racers upset North Carolina State in the NCAA Tournament and a few years later, nearly became the first No. 16 seed to upset a No. 1 in the tourney.
Coaching the Racers’ men’s basketball program from 1985-91, Newton assisted another hall of famer, Coach Ron Greene when they arrived at MSU from Mississippi State in the fall of 1978.
In six seasons as MSU head coach, Newton’s teams scored 116 victories and averaged 19.3 per season, which included a program-record four-straight post-season appearances. MSU made NCAA Tournament appearances in 1988, 1990, and 1991, plus a National Invitation Tournament appearance in 1989. Newton’s teams produced 14 All-OVC players including four straight OVC Player of the Year winners, two each by Jeff Martin and Popeye Jones. He also recruited MSU hall of fame point guard Don Mann.
This highly successful age of Racer basketball saw Greene and then Newton led the Racers to seven Ohio Valley Conference regular-season titles and three OVC Tournament titles in 1988, 1990, 1991. During the 12-year run of these two great coaches, the Racers were regular-season champions in eight seasons.
Coach Newton, inducted into the OVC Hall of Fame in 2007 and the Murray State Hall of Fame in 2010, added a third hall of fame honor in 2019 when Indiana State honored him. Newton was part of great success at Gerstman High School in the late 1950s for coach Howard Sharpe and Newton played at Indiana State for Coach Dwayne Klueh, who had played for legendary coach John Wooden. In a distant way, Newton was a part of the Coach Wooden tree and he adopted Wooden’s knack of having a rolled-up game program in his hand during games.
“I actually saw Coach Wooden on television, he had a rolled-up game program and when the officials made a call be didn’t like, he’d slap that program against his leg to let them know he didn’t like the call,” Newton remembers. “That stayed with me for a lifetime and it made me more comfortable on the sidelines.”
As a high school sophomore in Terre Haute in 1958, Newton recalls a chance meeting with Murray State legend, Coach Cal Luther, when he visited the Newton home one Saturday morning. Little did Steve know that he would become head coach at Murray State about 30 years later.
“There was a knock on the door on a Saturday and I answered it,” Newton remembers. “This gentleman said ‘hello, I am Cal Luther, the new head coach at Murray State and I’d like to speak with Bill Newton (Steve’s older brother).” Even though Bill Newton didn’t end up playing at Murray State, the story sticks because Steve Newton eventually became friends with Coach Luther when he came to Murray State in 1978.
As a young high school coach in Indiana, Newton had stints at Reelsville and Plainfield from 1963-69. In 1971, he got a career-changing invitation from Ron Greene, a former player for the Racers under Coach Luther and rising college coach. Greene hired Newton for his staff at NCAA D-II New Orleans, where the team eventually became ranked first in the nation. Newton followed Greene to Mississippi State where Greene was Southeastern Conference Coach of the Year in 1978. Murray State called Greene home to Racer Arena in the fall of 1978 and Newton followed. When Greene took the job at Indiana State in 1985, Newton became the Racers’ ninth head coach.
In the 1987-88 season, the Racers were 6-7 as they headed into Ohio Valley Conference play, but had played a tough schedule with close losses to Memphis and Western Kentucky. When league play began, the Racers got hot and won the regular-season championship at 13-1 behind future MSU hall of famers, Jeff Martin and Don Mann. That led the Racers and Coach Newton to an intersection with fate in one of the Racers’ greatest wins in program history.
As a 14th seed, the Racers were matched against 1983 NCAA Tournament champion, North Carolina State, a third seed. Given little to no chance of winning, the Racers pulled off the upset of Coach Jim Valvano’s squad in Lincoln, Nebraska 79-75. In the Racers’ first NCAA appearance since 1969, they produced the program’s first win.
“We felt fortunate to get the seed we had,” Newton said. “And we just went out and played shirts and skins. The rest is history. We played well that day and we played with a lot of confidence. We felt that we could win that game and we did.”
The phrase “shirts and skins” refers to a way to tell who the teams were on the playground basketball court. Newton said this phrase many times to help his team realize that the game was won by the team that played the best and not the team that was more known.”
“I think we had a good game plan that day to defend them that day in Lincoln,” Newton said. “We did some things they probably had not seen during the season. It threw them off a little and maybe they weren’t ready to play mentally. It all put us in a great position to get the upset and when it happened, it was a wonderful time. The best handshake I ever had in college coaching was with Jim Valvano after that game. It was a tremendous feeling.”
In the second game with Kansas, the Racers felt they had a chance to play with the eventual national champion Jayhawks. It was a close game that came down to the final possession where Kansas squeaked out a 61-58 win over the Racers.
“Coach Larry Brown and I were friendly and had known each other for a while,” Newton said. “He called me after they had won the national championship and asked me how it felt to finish second. I said, what are you talking about? He said that we played them better than any game they had on their way to winning it all.”
Coach Matt McMahon, is about to begin his sixth season at Murray State and is the eighth consecutive Racer coach to take the team to the NCAA Tournament. It started with Coach Newton in 1988 (He added additional NCAA appearances in 1990 and 1991) and followed with Scott Edgar (1992, 1995), Mark Gottfried (1997, 1998), Tevester Anderson (1999, 2002), Mick Cronin (2004, 2006), Billy Kennedy (2010), Steve Prohm (2012) and McMahon (2018, 2019).
“I am quite impressed with Matt and what he has been able to do,” Newton stated. “Sustaining a winning program is a very challenging thing to do. Murray State has a long line of great coaches and players. But it’s all about the players. Matt has continued to take the program to championship levels and he’s doing a great job.”
Dave Winder is the sports information director at Murray State University. He hosts a weekly podcast with current and past MSU sports personalities at www.goracers.com.
