The Texas Longhorns baseball program has a proud tradition, and for good reason. The team has won six College World Series championships and finished runner-up six other times in 39 trips to Omaha, more than any other Division I program.
Baseball began in Austin in the 1880s, and the earliest record of baseball activity (prior to when the program was established formally. UT headed to Georgetown to play, and what seemed like an unremarkable beginning had a remarkable outcome.
Photo courtesy of KVUE
Just before the train departed for the game, two students, Venable Proctor and Clarence Miller, went into a general store to buy ribbons to support the University of Texas. The shopkeeper had only a few colors, so he gave them what he had in stock: white (used for weddings) and orange (few customers bought that color).
Little did the students know that this chance encounter would become history; the colors became those of UT’s athletic teams.
Varsity baseball was officially established in 1884, about the same time that the university’s football program began (1883) and well before UT’s basketball program launched (1906).
The baseball team played its first game in 1895 against Southwestern University. The start was inauspicious: UT lost 22-6. The Longhorns quickly bounced back, beating Add-Ran College (now Texas Christian University) shortly thereafter.
A program that began with a loss became something far more. The program holds an all-time record of 3,953-1,498-32, and that 72.4% winning percentage is the highest in NCAA Division I college basketball history.
Over the decades, the Longhorns baseball program has achieved incredible milestones. It will continue that tradition in the years to come.
