Year graduated
1946
Major accomplishments
Scored a record 30 points for the state championship game in ‘46; Mr. Basketball; Named one of Indiana’s best 50 players of all time in 1999; Indiana Basketball Hall of Famer.
“Jumpin”’ Johnny Wilson, voted Mr. Basketball in 1946 after leading I the Anderson Indians to their third state championship, is often I asked how he acquired his nickname.
“My sophomore year in high school sports writer Corky Lamm put that on me, ‘cause I was the only person dunkin the ball at that time,” said the nearly 6-foot Wilson, who scored 30 points in the Indians’ 67-53 victory over Fort Wayne Central in the ‘46 title game, and broke the previous record of 26 set by Dick Porter of Lebanon in the 1912 championship game.
Wilson can’t dunk anymore, but he is still following the bouncing ball. For the last four years, Johnny has been assisting his son, John Jr., who is head coach at Loch Haven (Pennsylvania) State College, an NCAA Division II school.
“I just felt I was too young to give up coaching,” said Wilson of his decision to join his son with the Bald Eagles after stints with old Wood High School in Indianapolis (eight years), Malcolm X College in Chicago (20 years), Anderson University (five years), Anderson High boys’ team (three years), and Anderson High girls’ team (three years). He was head coach at Wood and Malcolm X, and assistant at the other three stops. “I’ve been in basketball over 65 years as a player and coach. It’s still as exciting as ever. I figure I’ve got another 12 or 13 years. I’m only 78.”
Few relationships in sports have been more enduring and genuine than the one between Wilson and Carl Erskine, a teammate at Anderson High. Wilson went on to play for the Harlem Globetrotters, Erskine to pitch for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Looking back, Wilson calls his life and career in basketball “tremendous.”
“Carl and I talk about it a lot. Here were two kids from the west side of Anderson. He was a little better off then I was, but we were both poor. We were able to fight through it, and make it to the top. He was able to play in the World Series, and I had a chance to travel around the world with the Trotters. Both of us were truly blessed to be able to accomplish that.”
The Wilson-Erskine relationship began in grade school, with Erskine jumping center when the pair helped the Shadeland Elementary School team win the city championship in 1939.
“Carl and I started running around together, along with another kid named Jack Rector in about the fourth grade,” said Wilson. “We probably spent better than 60 percent of our time together. Jack had a basketball goal on his barn in the alley, and we’d play there day after day, and it’d be ice cold and bloody, whatever. We’d go in and get warm, then go back out and play some more.”
Erskine has said that if you could dribble on the frozen mud behind Jack’s barn, you could dribble anywhere. “That’s right,” said Wilson. “I feel we built our skills up by working like that outside all the time. My relationship with Carl, who was a tremendous basketball player, goes on to this day. We play golf together when I’m back in town.”
In 1944, the Indians were favored to win the state championship, but Wilson was injured in a semifinal round victory over Aurora. Anderson went on to lose in the afternoon game of the four-team finals, 30-26, to Kokomo.
“We had by far the best team in the state that year,” said Wilson. “I went up for a shot against Aurora in the semifinals and a guy undercut me. I landed on my back. I didn’t practice before the finals. We beat Kokomo by 13 points on their floor during the regular season. I could rebound in the finals, but I couldn’t get going fast enough to get down the floor on the fast break.
“When I left the house that morning, I told my mom to clear off the top of the radio—we didn’t have television then—that’s where we’re gonna put the trophy. It didn’t happen.”
The Indians did secure the state trophy in 1946, although it didn’t appear they would do that well in the tournament after an 11-7 regular season, in which Anderson lost three of its last four games. What turned it around for coach Charles Cummings’ crew that had beaten nine teams by an average margin of 15 points in the tournament?
“We had a meeting and Coach tried to find out what was our problem,” said Wilson. “One kid said, ‘Well, you yell too much.’ Cummings took the player into his office, and heard him say that the players wanted to win one game to show people they could win.” Wilson said that Cumming’s reply was, “We coaches say, ‘Don’t worry, we’re gonna win it all.’
“From that day on we played great ball, and one of the big reasons was Bob Ritter. He and I made the Indiana All-Star team that year. Bob hadn’t scored much, but he started wearing glasses. He played better ball every game.”
After losing to Fort Wayne Central, 49-22, during the season, many people thought that the Indians had little chance to reverse the score in their title-game rematch. However, Wilson believed otherwise, and scored 30 points on 11 field goals and eight free throws. Ritter had 15 points.
One of Wilson’s biggest disappointments came at a banquet following the team’s state championship. He wanted to play at Indiana University, but IU coach Branch McCracken squashed that thought during a question-and-answer session.
“McCracken was asked if [I] came to IU, would [I] be able to play basketball,” stated Wilson. “Well, at that time no black had ever played for the Big Ten. He said, I don’t think he could make my team.’ He didn’t have a single person on that team that I hadn’t played against, and I hadn’t had any problems.”
An all-around athlete, Wilson wound up at Anderson College (now Anderson University), where he played basketball, football, baseball, and ran track. After college Wilson played one year with the Chicago American Giants of the Negro Baseball League as an outfielder.
“There were such names as Elston Howard, Willie Mays, Junior Gilliam, and Joe Black in the league,” said Wilson. “I hit around .317.1 faced Joe Black in the Negro World Series. The first time I went to bat against him, I hit a ball almost for a home run. A guy caught it going into the fence. I said, £Hey, [Black] is mine.’ Well, Joe struck me out seven straight times after that. I struck out probably ten times in the regular season.”
Of his Mr. Basketball award, Wilson says, “At the time it was the greatest honor I ever had—for a high school kid in Indiana, that is tops. But being rated as one of the 50 best Indiana players ever the night in 1999 when the Pacers opened Conseco Fieldhouse topped Mr. Basketball. People were in there like Oscar [Robertson], the greatest of all time; coach [John] Wooden, Reggie Miller, [Walt] Bellamy, Don Schlundt, Jimmy Rayl, George McGinnis—to be there with names like those was special.”
Wilson also says his relationship with his high school coach, Cummings, was “the best. If it hadn’t been for him, I don’t know where I’d be today. A lot of times you find coaches that when you’re through playing you have no more good contact with them. But this guy followed my career all the way.
“After retiring, he moved to Arkansas. When I was coaching at Malcolm X, we played down in Missouri, near Joplin. He drove three different times 100 miles in the winter to watch my team play. That’s the kind of man he was.”