Hinkle a staple of Indiana hoops

Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS

Sometimes at Hinkle Fieldhouse, you can see haze in the air from dust that can never quite be cleaned up. The court creaks a bit in places — the man who hit the most famous shot here calls it sensitive.

And the sunlight that sometimes shines onto the floor through those huge windows?

“That’s homecourt advantage,” Butler’s assistant athletic director Carl Heck says with a grin.

Magic has happened in this venerable building, from the 1954 high school showdown that inspired “Hoosiers” to the undefeated homecourt record that Butler put up on its run to this weekend’s Final Four just a few miles away. The “Old Barn” just has that feeling, more than a movie, a building or a floor. For decades, it was the court of dreams in Indiana.

“It was such a wonderful place to play in,” said Oscar Robertson, who won two state championships there. “It was so mystical.”

Gordon Hayward, whose grandson, Gordon, is the star of the Bulldog team, knows it.

“It’s historic, a beautiful facility,” the elder Hayward says. “You know, my grandson had offers from other schools, like Purdue and Michigan, but he chose to come here because he thought they had the best facility.”

Bobby Plump, now 73, was the inspiration for the movie when he hit the shot that beat Muncie Central, a school 10 times larger than Plump’s little Milan High.

“I only had 10 points against Muncie Central,” Plump says now. “It was the worst game I had in two years of tournament play, but it’s the one everybody remembers.”

Plump’s shot was instant legend in Indiana, and it became a worldwide phenomenon after the movie debuted in 1986, with the championship scenes filmed in the fieldhouse.

“That probably stands out as the most significant thing to happen in high school basketball,” Pacers president Larry Bird said. “For Milan to be able to win a state championship had to be something special, not only then, but to see it evolve over the next 50 years is pretty magnificent.”

When completed in 1928, the fieldhouse held more than 15,000 people, the largest such facility in the nation during its first 20 years of existence. It is now on the National Register of Historic Places.

Over time, the building has become somewhat modernized. Chairs were added around the lower section in 1989, dropping the seating capacity to 11,000.

“The people that really appreciate tradition and history love it,” Butler coach Brad Stevens says.