The Campaign for UB
1958 Lambert Cup Team Football Scholarship Endowment
Established in honor of the 1958 UB Bulls Football Team, this fund provides an annual scholarship to a student-athlete on the team.
1958 was a great year for UB football. UB won eight games and defeated then-powerhouses Columbia and Harvard, making UB the top small college football program in the East and winner of the Lambert Cup.
With an invitation to play Florida State in the Tangerine Bowl in Orlando, it was arguably UB’s best season in 102 years of football. What happened next also made it one of the university’s finest hours.
UB was informed that the team’s two African-American players, Willie Evans and Mike Wilson, would not be welcome in Orlando because it would violate a rule of the host Orlando, Fla., school district prohibiting blacks and whites from playing on the same field. The team unanimously rejected the bowl invitation.
The 1958 team’s unified stance against racism was a great and principled action, inspiring to others, and dignified themselves, the university, and all of Buffalo in the eyes of the entire nation.
This fund was established by members of the 1958 team.
