Glen Whitis was one of the most intimidating human beings I’ve ever been around. Whitis was a great basketball player at Howard Payne, a post player who was big, strong, and had a devastating hook shoot. Then, not too long after that, he became the head coach at his alma mater. His teams turned into a national power in the 1960s. He was intimidating because of his size, his voice, his bravado, etc. Certainly, for a very young sportscaster in 1964, he was almost too intimidating.

I didn’t know Glen before I became the Voice of the Jackets, and he didn’t know me, but he certainly made sure that I knew he was the boss. And it wasn’t just me. Anybody in the coliseum back in the 60s, if they paid any attention, knew that when coach got mad he would raise that huge right leg of his and slam it down on the court with so much force that you could almost feel the vibration. I have no doubt that there were many officials and several players back then that probably got a shiver up their spines when they heard that foot stomp down.

Back in the mid 60s, we were in the national championship tournament in Kansas City. We went up there in what was the standard mode for Howard Payne teams back then. They had two white station wagons and anytime we went on a long trip, we took them plus somebody’s individual car. That’s how the team traveled.

We had taken off for Kansas City and you can’t quite make Kansas City without going through Oklahoma. This was when Oklahoma didn’t have an interstate highway system going through the state, so you went through the hills of Oklahoma to eventually get to Kansas City. Those hills had a two-lane highway with two fairly good shoulders running through them. That was it. The traffic would back up in both directions and there was seldom a way to pass. Mostly, you just drove behind people at whatever speed they were traveling and didn’t pass very often.

Coach Whitis was driving the first station wagon and I was put in charge of the second wagon, then the family car was behind me. We hit one of those lines of cars and trucks shortly after going into Oklahoma and Whitis ran up behind it and I thought to myself, “Well, coach is going to get slowed up a little bit here.” To my amazement, he went around on the right side, on the shoulder, and started throwing up gravel and dirt as he sped off into the distance. Meanwhile, I’m behind the line, below the speed limit, just trying to get there in one piece.

About 15-20 minutes later we come upon a store on the right side of the road with cars parked around it, except for this white station wagon out on the edge of the highway with a great big guy laying on the hood with his back to the windshield. I assumed I was supposed to turn in there, so I turned in and pulled up.

Whitis yelled at me and said, “Boy, come here.” So with my head down I walked over to him and he said, “Let me tell you son, if you can’t keep up, give the keys to somebody who can.” I took the keys and tossed them at him. Knowing they might be the last works I would ever speak, I said, “If I’ve got to drive like a maniac like you, I’m not doing it.” I then proceeded to tell him what we could do with the keys.

He laughed in a big, powerful way, got down off the hood of that wagon and said, “Well boy, you’ve got a little spunk.” Glen Whitis, from that point on, became a very good friend of mine and he treated me like I was a friend of his as well.

Ironically, Coach Whitis died in a head-on collision near Abilene in 1972. I still remember what the preacher said at his funeral. “If you think God can’t use a big, tough, intimidating man in His army, you’d be wrong.”

Until next time, so long everybody.

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‘Out of the Box’ with Dallas Huston is published each Monday morning at BrownwoodNews.com. Dallas was the radio voice of the Brownwood Lions and Howard Payne Yellow Jackets for more than 55 years. He currently is Pastor of Center City Baptist Church and hosts a Men’s Bible Study in Brownwood on Monday evenings. Your comments are welcome at [email protected].