The news the other day stopped me in my tracks. One of the greatest basketball players in Montana history, Elvis Old Bull, died in a rollover accident on I-90 east of Billings.
I got a bit emotional when I read the story in the Billings Gazette. That reaction was a surprise as I never saw him play. Old Bull’s basketball career culminated in a third consecutive state championship at Lodge Grass High School in 1990, two years before I moved to Montana to work as a sportswriter. By then he had settled into life on the Crow Indian Reservation. Old Bull was heavily recruited, but like many American Indian students, athletes or otherwise, college is rarely in the offing.
I reveled in the stories folks told of Old Bull’s exploits back when Lodge Grass was the most feared team in Class B. East of the divide, folks will tell you that Class B is the soul of prep basketball in Montana, with a slew of quality Indian teams and the great rivalries of farm towns on the Hi-Line.
Though I’ve probably inflated it in my imagination well beyond reality, one story always comes to mind when talk turns to Lodge Grass. Friends who saw Old Bull play at one of those state tournaments described the roads leading to the gym as littered with abandoned clunkers from the Rez. The hand-painted mantra “Elvis Lives” was scrawled across the now immobile vehicles.
Apparently, when Elvis was in the gym, you drove whatever beat up old jalopy you could get your hands on until it died. You hitched a ride the rest of the way.
I got a taste of American Indian hoops working west of the divide. Maybe the best game I ever covered pitted Corvallis against Arlee in a regular season matchup between the leaders of the old 5B conference. Buzzy Fyant led an interracial Arlee squad against a Corvallis team stacked with kids from the old-school Mormon town of Pinesdale. That was a clash of cultures. After an epic fourth quarter Corvallis comeback, Arlee won on a half court buzzer beater.
I attended my only Class B state tournament back in 1994 in Dahlberg Arena. Lodge Grass made the field, but bowed out without hardware. Fairfield won with another Class B legend, coach Dean Gamradt, prowling the sidelines with his trademark nervous, hacking cough. While a few thousand fans attended most games, my friends who were Class B hoops aficionados told me that regular season games between Hi-Line powers such routinely hosted bigger crowds.
Those same hoops gurus lamented that the Lodge Grass players no longer wore traditional American Indian headdresses during warm ups. Part of the spectacle of Class B hoops was lost with the end of that tradition.
Old Bull’s high school exploits drew national attention, including a write-up in Sports Illustrated. He scored 1,984 points in his career, and also handed out 484 assists. He was a three-time state tournament MVP.
But he famously never played college ball. Reportedly, he stopped going to class once Lodge Grass won the title his senior year. That part of the story is more important than the legend of Old Bull the baller. Unlocking the cultural forces that hinder so many American Indian kids on their journey to a stable and successful adult life is one of the keys to ending the hopeless desperation that can mar life on the reservation.
I know of Old Bull’s life second hand. There are grainy newspaper photos of him on the court, and this week, a slew of obituaries recounting his 42 years. This final story ends on an optimistic note. Old Bull was working in construction. Old Bull was inducted into the Montana Indian Athletic Hall of Fame in 2008. And Elvis Old Bull Jr., managed to eclipse his dad in one important regard, playing hoops as a student-athlete at Rocky Mountain College in Billings.
The man I never knew and never witnessed leading a fast break is gone. But I suspect the legend of Elvis Old Bull will continue to touch us for a long time.