Joyce Dye answers the phone this early August afternoon from she and her husband, Everett’s, retirement living home in Midland, Texas.
Everett, 92, the lone survivor of the University of Kansas 1952 NCAA championship team, just had a fall and can’t come to the phone at this time.
“Age is taking its toll,” said Joyce, who was friends with Everett growing up together in Independence, where they attended elementary school through high school. They both remarried in 2005 after their first spouse passed; Joyce was actually good friends with Everett’s late wife, Helen.
“He’s just been having great trouble walking and we did have around the clock care,” Joyce said. “(Someone) was helping him walk and he just went down. We have some firemen close by that do this for security and they would come pick anybody up in this facility, which is nice. They’re on their way. I don’t know how long it will take.”
I had been emailing Joyce a few times to set up the interview and talk about Dick Harp, Everett’s beloved former assistant coach at Kansas. Joyce emailed that “Everett would love to be able to talk to you but has memory issues and carrying on a conversation is difficult. He remembers little of the past but does remember Dick. He often said Dick did not receive the recognition he deserved. He did speak of Dick often as someone he had admired and valued as a coach.”
When I called Joyce this afternoon and we began talking after his fall, she said it was “worth a try” for me to speak to Everett, a 6-foot-2 reserve guard/forward on the 1951-52 title team and ‘52-53 NCAA runner-up squad.
I’ve always been truly drawn and captivated by Everett since I had never forgotten a quote I once heard from him about my hero Harp. Everett said fondly with reverence: “He knew what he wanted. He knew how to communicate it and he did so that you wanted to listen. I have all kinds of affection for that man. Always have, always will.”
“I heard him say some years ago all the things you quoted him as saying,” Joyce said. “He was always remarking about him and always saying he didn't get enough recognition. I know that but he really does not remember much. He doesn't talk on the phone much because he just can't carry on a conversation, but those were his words for sure that you quoted. I do know how much he thought of him (Harp) and how much he would process this if he could process this. He would be so glad somebody is going ahead and giving him the recognition he’s due.
“What he said was exactly what he would have said (now) in his right mind,” Joyce added. “He said that over and over to me and he knew what he meant exactly. He looked up to him so much (and) really did think a lot of him. In fact, he used to visit his wife (Martha Sue) every year (in Lawrence) after (Dick) passed (in 2000 at age 81). He kept up with her regularly because he thought so much of her husband.”
Martha Sue passed in 2009 at age 91.
Joyce continued talking about Everett and his KU days. She said Everett and future Hall of Fame North Carolina head coach Dean Smith roomed together at Kansas, and were “very close.”
“Before (Smith) took that position (as UNC head coach in 1961), he asked Everett if he would come and be second man in command (assistant coach),” Joyce said. “Now this is what I know; I cannot prove that but he already was in the ROTC program (at KU) and had military time to serve and so he didn't accept that but he did ask him to do that.
“I don't know if I really should be telling you this,” Joyce added, “but he and Dean both really knew a lot about basketball. Both of them at one point in time, they thought they knew better on one play (than head coach Phog Allen) and did it. After that, neither one of them played a whole lot. I thought that was (his) undoing. But I know when he was playing in high school they said he was ‘poetry in motion’ and so he was a good player. But once you go against the orders of the coach you're in trouble. They both did that and I don’t know why. I don't know the real details of it but I just thought that’s why neither one of them played a whole lot.”
Everett was recruited by Allen to KU and also by K-State as an Independence High School star.
“We had a very successful team,” Joyce said. “He really had a good reputation. I think he was the only basketball player from Independence that was chosen to be on the (KU) team.”
Everett played 23 games during his collegiate career (12 in 1951-52 and 11 contests in 1952-53) and averaged 0.5 points per game (12 total points, including nine in ’51-52). Statistics aside, he was a very hard worker, pushed the starters in practice, and soaked up great knowledge from Allen and especially Harp.
Everett did not play at KU his senior year in 1953-54; instead he took that year to focus on academics.
“I think it was because he needed to devote more time to his college work,” Joyce said. “He wasn’t playing a whole lot and it was not so important at that time. He thought, ‘I better concentrate on my schooling here.’ I think that was the primary reason. We haven’t discussed that a lot, but I do remember that at the time.”
I asked Joyce how Everett felt about playing for Phog Allen.
“He never said much about Phog, it was always about Dick,” Joyce said. “How he really felt about Phog Allen, I'm not really sure. He didn’t express himself about him much.”
Everett now comes to the phone. I tell him that I’m sorry he had a fall.
“If I just listen to the people around me, like doctors,” Everett said softly, “it will be OK.”
Joyce asks him what he thought of Phog.
“He was a darn good coach,” Everett replied.
The subject turns to Everett’s loyalty to Harp and his yearly visits to Martha Sue after Dick died. His voice lights up.
“I sure did,” he said about visiting Martha Sue. “I'm glad I talked to her. It was a very important thing to do.”
All for his deep admiration and love for Dick Harp and the priceless life lessons he taught.
“He knew what he was doing and he was doing it to the people he was working towards to help us,” Everett said. “I just happened to be one of them.”
Everett teamed with LaVannes Squires, the first black KU basketball player and also the first in the Big Seven, along with Kansas State’s Gene Wilson. Everett, who was in the same year as Squires, said Harp was color blind.
“He didn’t care whether the player was white or black, it didn't make any difference,” Everett said. “The other players accepted him fully. (Harp) just wanted to convey it to the players what he thought they needed to do as a coach.”
Everett was quite fond of Squires, a pioneer and the consummate team player.
“He was taking a huge step for the team,” Everett said. “He was always thinking of us, the players. I was very appreciative of it.”
While Everett was thrilled to win the national title in 1952, learning “a lot from it,” and enjoying returning to Lawrence for reunions and bond and reminisce with his former teammates and friends, Joyce said “he doesn’t talk about it (NCAA title). Many people don’t know.”
But there was one circumstance when the couple lived in Bartlesville, Okla., where some workers came over to their home and notice a framed reunion picture of the championship team in a bookcase with Everett and teammates like Clyde Lovellette and Dean Smith.
“They would come out and talk to Everett because they didn’t realize he was on that team until they saw that picture,” Joyce said.
Kansas returned to the national title game in 1953, when the Jayhawks lost a heartbreaking 69-68 defeat to Indiana. KU’s Jerry Alberts, a seldom-used reserve, who replaced star center B.H. Born after Born fouled out, barely missed a baseline jumper at the buzzer.
Everett, who related that Harp “did the coaching” when he played while Phog was the motivator, said he remembers that season and game “vaguely,” yet recalled the loss to IU “very discouraging.”
After graduating from KU in 1955, Dye entered the Air Force and served 24 years, retiring in Denver as Colonel. Afterward, he and a “number of friends” started an Evangelical Presbyterian church in Cherry Hills Creek, Colo., which has now grown to about 8,000 members.
“They started it and it just grew and grew and grew,” Joyce said. “It moved from one place to another. Now, it’s in Highlands Ranch, a suburb of Denver. It’s large with a very big program. It’s been hugely successful. He did that for about eight years.”
Everett said thoughtfully that he fully appreciated Harp’s wisdom he taught him at KU years afterward, while serving in the Air Force and working with the church.
“I had to listen to what he had to say,” Everett said. “When I went into my work, it helped out immensely. I began to realize after I got into my job how much I had really learned from him. It kind of helped me form the foundation with the job I was given. It took me a while to realize how good it was, and that I could use that and grow within myself. That was very important. I didn’t realize how much it did help out until I began to use it.”
Joyce agrees.
“Everett was always a good listener,” she said. “That was one of the reasons he got along so well with the men beneath him in the service. That probably was reflective of what Dick taught about listening. That was a big part and probably had influence of the way he reacted.”
“Yes, that’s true,” Everett said.
Joyce said Everett had great “influence in the church with his main job as visitation pastor (not ordained). He was quite loved by the parishioners there for that reason.”
“He was very important there,” Joyce said. “That church was amazing. I’m very grateful I got to be there. He had a great part in the formation of that church. Very impressive. I’m sure whatever Dick shared with him or taught him had its influence on his relationships in that church. I’m sure he had a big influence on Everett because he talked about him so much. I know he was a big influence and influenced what he did later in life.”
The couple moved from Bartlesville to Midland three years ago after Joyce developed pneumonia, and knew they needed more help and be closer to family. Joyce has a sister and three grandchildren and six great grandchildren in Midland. She also has a son in Houston.
“There was no family member close (in Bartlesville),” Joyce said, “and they just kind of moved us in the dark of night to Midland. And so that’s why we’re here. We just knew it would be better for us to be taken care of. It’s just hard to uproot and make a new life.”
But Everett and Joyce are making the most of their situation. It’s been a full life bettering society and meeting up and finding love again after their childhood friendship.
Everett, who has two sons, five grandchildren, and four great grandchildren, still keeps a close eye on his beloved Jayhawks.
“Yes, I do,” he said as his voice rises. “I watch it very closely.”
Everett truly enjoyed watching KU beat North Carolina in 2022 on television for the national championship, just like he won an NCAA title 70 years earlier.
“I remember Everett was watching the game with his robe and ball cap,” Joyce said, laughing. “I just thought it was a funny picture.”
Now, it’s been 71 years since Everett had the once-in-a-lifetime honor to play for Harp. His love and reverence for Dick has never wavered.
How would Everett like Dick Harp to be remembered?
“The very top,” he said. “I had a high regard for him. I was just so pleased he was the coach. It meant so much not only to me, but all the players. He was a heckuva coach.”
