Before Milan: Wingate High School’s Basketball Championships of 1913 and 1914

In 1954, tiny Milan High School beat the odds, and became Indiana’s high school basketball champion. Writers have told, re-told and immortalized the tale in the 1986 film Hoosiers. Drowned out among the Milan hullabaloo are histories of other and earlier small schools that slew goliaths to win basketball crowns. In 1914, Milan played in its first state basketball tournament and lost in the first round. Their opponent that year was not a big-city juggernaut. Rather, it was the original Indiana basketball version of David: Wingate High School. If Milan is the “greatest basketball story ever told,” then Wingate is the “greatest basketball story seldom/never told.” To help bring their overlooked story to light, here is a survey of Wingate’s championship seasons in ...Read more