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Jim Brandenburg

G

Gaeilge1

Well-known member
For those of you who have not already heard, former UM Head Coach Jim Brandenburg passed away at age 87 over this past weekend.

Brandenburg coached the Griz for 2 years after legendary coach Jud Heathcote left for Michigan State. After the 1977-78 season he left for the University of Wyoming, where he led the Cowboys to 3 NCAA tournament's in 9 years as head coach, including one trip to the Sweet 16. The Cowboys were also the NIT runner-up in 1986!

At Montana, his first season he was 6-20, due to the unfortunate debacle with player Lee Johnson, who was declared ineligible during the season, which forced the Grizzlies to forfeit 11 wins. His next season the Griz went 20-9 with a 12-2 BSC record and a conference championship!

RIP Coach!
 
Thanks for posting a link to that podcast. Brandenburg told some great stories about Heathcote and others from the early days. Interesting to hear him describe Heathcote as a "genius" -- not just in terms of being very good at his job, but having a high IQ -- and his talent for telling dirty jokes. The Michael Ray Richardson recruitment story was also fascinating.

I was a student at UM back in the 70s, so it was a wonderful time to watch the teams coached by Heathcote and Brandenburg. Great memories.
 
I remember how devastating the decision to strip the team of those wins because Lee Johnson a great player who was dom inating inside and was declared ineligible over some obscure technicality was never explained...similar to the Pfluger debacle
 
For those who might be interested, after his tenure at Montana was cut woefully short, Lee Johnson became a 4 year started at East Texas State University where he had a very storied career. He was the 17th overall pick in the 1979 NBA draft, by the Houston Rockets! He spent the 1979-80 season with both Houston and the Detroit Pistons.
After one year in the NBA Johnson had a successful career in Europe, playing for several teams and league's, ultimately retiring in 1993. He is now 66 years old and estimated to be worth 1 to 5 million dollars!

Not bad for a kid who was accused of not having the proper high school transcripts to compete in the Big Sky Conference!
 
Gaeilge1 said:
For those who might be interested, after his tenure at Montana was cut woefully short, Lee Johnson became a 4 year started at East Texas State University where he had a very storied career. He was the 17th overall pick in the 1979 NBA draft, by the Houston Rockets! He spent the 1979-80 season with both Houston and the Detroit Pistons.
After one year in the NBA Johnson had a successful career in Europe, playing for several teams and league's, ultimately retiring in 1993. He is now 66 years old and estimated to be worth 1 to 5 million dollars!

Not bad for a kid who was accused of not having the proper high school transcripts to compete in the Big Sky Conference!
Click to expand...

Didn't know all that history about Lee Johnson. Happy to hear he rebounded from his bad experience in the Big Sky Conference.
 
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