City Dump: The Story of the 1951 CCNY Basketball Scandal
From Hoopedia
City Dump: The Story of the 1951 CCNY Basketball Scandal is a 1998 HBO documentary that examines one of the most notorious incidents in college basketball history, when seven members of the City College of New York (CCNY) basketball team conspired with gamblers to fix games over two seasons (1949-51).
The film features HBO's critically acclaimed blend of rarely seen home movies and revealing interviews with the people who witnessed and chronicled one of the darkest chapters in sports history.
Interviewed for the special are former New York area college players Al McGuire and Junius Kellogg, broadcasters Marty Glickman and Marvin Kalb, authors Dave Anderson, Maury Allen, Stanley Cohen, Avery Corman, Charles Rosen and Sidney Zion, CCNY alumni Larry Gralla, Mort Sheinman, Dick Kaplan, Al Ragusa, Hannan Wexler, Moe Bragin and Ron Nadell, former New York City assistant district attorney Vincent O'Connor, Jackie Mason and others.
The CCNY basketball team of 1949-51 consisted of an extraordinary collection of players guided by venerable coach Nat Holman, with the 1949-50 Beavers becoming the first and only team ever to win both the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) and NCAA Division I Men's Tournament championship titles in the same season. Prompted by this success, college basketball soared in popularity, as New York's Madison Square Garden emerged as the mecca of college hoops.
Spearheading CCNY's meteoric rise in basketball were New York high school products Ed Roman, Herb Cohen, Al Roth, Floyd Lane, Norm Mager, Ed Warner and Irwin Dambrot. In its penultimate season of 1949-50, the squad rolled to seven consecutive post-season victories and two titles, overcoming the likes of Kentucky, San Francisco, Ohio State and Bradley.
A year later, the players, the program and New York City major college basketball were all in turmoil. Each of the CCNY seven would eventually be charged with taking money to fix games. College basketball in New York was forever changed.
The executive producer is Ross Greenburg; producers are George Roy and Steve Stern of Black Canyon Productions. David Harmon is the coordinating producer. Liev Schreiber narrates.
