© by Ray Sanchez 05.15.16
And the legend of the 1966 Texas Western College Miners continues to grow. 
Last year, four students from Moriarty High School in Albuquerque got together and decided to enter the New Mexico National History Day State Championships.
They picked the 1966 Miners as their theme.
Ah, but where to start? Louis Baudoin, a member of the ’66 team who now lives in Albuquerque, suggested El Paso’s Joe Gomez, who has become known as the Miners’ biggest fan.
The four students (Salomon Chavez, Matt Smith, Dehaven Hudson and Courtney Wiggins) contacted Joe. Of course, he was eager to help and not only pointed them in the right direction but provided them with plenty of material.
THIS YEAR’S competition theme for National History Day is “Exploration, Encounter and Exchange in History.” The students created a documentary about the 1966 Texas Western season. They spent time interviewing players, coaches, historians and archivists at the 50th anniversary celebration held at UTEP in February of this year.
And now, after winning the state competition, the Albuquerque students, along with teacher Amy Page, will be headed to the National History Day competition to be held June 12-16.
By the strangest of coincidences, the national competition will be held at the University of Maryland. That’s where the 1966 championship game was held and where the Miners beat Kentucky.
And wouldn’t’ it be neat for the students, and the Miners, if they won first place?
Of course, Joe Gomez plans to be there.
Let’s wish the students luck.
TRIVIA QUESTION: Here’s a good one for you baseball historians. Who replaced Lou Gehrig at first base for the New York Yankees when he retired after 2130 games? Answer at end of column.
HOT DIGGITY. We have another potential Triple Crown winner for the second year in a row, Nyquist, and he has a Sunland Park Racetrack and Casino connection so we El Pasoans have someone for whom to cheer.
Nyquist, who easily won the Kentucky Derby May 7, is trained by Doug O’Neill, one of Sunland’s best friends. O’Neill, who regularly trains at Santa Anita racetrack in California, has been a big fan of the Grade III Sunland Derby and enters a horse often. Not only that, he won two of the first three Sunland Derbys. That was with Excessivepleasure in 2003 and Thor’s Echo in 2005.
NEEDLESS TO say winning all three Triple Crown races (the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont) in one year is no easy task. Only 12 horses have accomplished that feat in 142 years. And there has never been a Triple Crown winner in consecutive years.
American Pharoah, trained by another good friend of Sunland Park Racetrack and Casino, Bob Baffert (he has won three Sunland Derbys), did it last year, so Nyquist will be setting a very special record if he can do it this year.
UNDER JOCKEY Mario Gutierrez, undefeated Nyquist made winning the Kentucky Derby for his eighth straight victory look easy. In fact, he did the mile and a quarter almost two seconds faster than American Pharoah last year.
Gutierrez says, “Nyquist only needs a horse to push him. If he feels somebody coming he’s going to keep going as fast as he needs to go. I have never doubted my horse.”
By the way, Gutierrez has already set a record of his own. He was aboard Derby winner I’ll Have Another in 2012 in his only other start in the Run for the Roses. He became the first jockey to win his first two Derby races.
Next up is the Preakness in Baltimore next Saturday, May 21. El Paso has a lot more racing fans than some people think, and we’ll all be cheering for Nyquist, and Doug O’Neill, all the way.
ANSWER TO trivia question: Ellsworth “Babe” Dahlgren.