Good morning, it’s March 16, 2021. Fifty-eight years ago today, two young men shook hands at the end of a basketball game, their last as collegiate players. Although the game was played in the Michigan city of East Lansing, it pitted Mississippi State against Bowling Green, both playing their last game in the 1963 NCAA tournament. The handshake took place between each team’s best player, Mississippi State forward Leland Mitchell and Bowling Green center Nate Thurmond, a future professional Hall of Famer.
Their easy gesture of good sportsmanship had followed a similar, more publicized handshake before the tipoff of Mississippi State’s game the previous night against Loyola of Chicago. In each of these two instances, a white Mississippi State player (all the team’s players were white) had shaken the hand of a black opponent. At the time, this meant a great deal.