Lovell Underwood

Lovell Underwood was born Lovell Thornton Underwood on December 13, 1902, in Carter County, Kentucky.  In October 1920, he left Carter County for Lexington to enter high school at the Odd Fellows Home.   He held many nicknames throughout his life including “Cowboy,” “Puncher,” and “LT.”

He was the star center for Lexington High School which won state and national championships in 1922.

As a freshman at Kentucky, he was second on the team in scoring and became the regular center for the Wildcats following his freshman season.

The 1925 Kentucky yearbook described Underwood:  “Underwood’s playing at forward left nothing to be desired.  He could handle the ball proficiently with either hand, and his playing at all times was far above the standard. He was fast, and an exceedingly good dribbler.”

He was a member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon social fraternity and was a member of Kentucky’s band.  He was also a member of Phi Mu Alpha, a musical honorary society.

On September 2, 1926, Underwood married Isabel Jewell in Shosoni, Wyoming.  Following their honeymoon, Underwood returned to Kentucky taking up residence in Winchester, Kentucky. They were a popular couple in Winchester, mentioned regularly in the Winchester Sun’s society pages.  They attended teas, dinners, and dances together.  In January 1927 the couple moved to Lexington and took rooms at the Hagerman Apartments on West Second Street. Later that year, Isabel returned to Wyoming.  It is believed that the couple divorced after this but no records have been located.

Underwood coached at Transylvania College in Lexington in the early 1930s and moved west to Yakima, Washington, in 1938, where he resided when Gonzaga hired him in May 1949.  He was also the Gonzaga Bulldogs baseball coach from 1949 to 1950.

Underwood was the head coach at Gonzaga University for two seasons, from 1949 to 1951, with an overall record of 26–33 (.441). Underwood resigned as head basketball coach in March 1951, and was succeeded by Hank Anderson, who stayed for 21 years.

Underwood stayed in Spokane and was an administrator in the county school system; he became the Spokane chapter manager of the Red Cross in 1959.  He later served with the organization in Japan.

Underwood died in Bellevue in 1997 at age 94.

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