The night Franco Harris brought joy back to Evansville

Here's the first paragraph of the Associated Press' news story about Franco Harris' death Wednesday:

Franco Harris, the Hall of Fame running back whose heads-up thinking authored “The Immaculate Reception,” considered the most iconic play in NFL history, has died. He was 72.

Yes, Franco Harris is best known in the sports world for that one play.

In Evansville, Franco Harris is also remembered for an incredible gesture that cultivated a generation of Steelers fans hundreds of miles from Pittsburgh.

More:Franco Harris, Steelers legend best known for making 'The Immaculate Reception,' dies at 72

Let's turn back the clock to Dec. 13, 1977, the night a DC-3 carrying 14 members of the University of Evansville men's basketball team crashed shortly after takeoff, killing them and 15 other people onboard. The head coach, Bobby Watson. The legendary radio voice of the Aces, Marv Bates. Trainers, fans, staff.

All gone in an instant.

People who experienced the tragedy in Evansville will tell you, to a person, about the pall it left over the city. Winters can be cold and tough and dark here. Now imagine a winter where the city's most beloved treasure, a college basketball team transitioning from its national powerhouse days in Division II to the bright lights of Division I, has been taken away.

Two months later, enter Franco Harris and the Pittsburgh Steelers. They'd won the Super Bowl in 1975 and 1976. They'd win again in 1979 and 1980.

Back then, some of the Steelers players also played basketball as a group in the offseason. Their coach was a Pittsburgh-area judge named Bernard "Baldy" Regan. Regan heard about the UE plane crash and wanted to bring the Steelers to Evansville to play a fundraiser basketball game against former Aces players.

Sure, Jack Ham and L.C. Greenwood would get some people in the stands, but Franco Harris was the key. He was an all-pro, one of the NFL's best running backs and as big a celebrity as you'd find in the league.

Franco Harris said yes to Evansville without hesitation. The game was set for Feb. 11, 1978.

"When I asked him, Franco said, 'I'll be glad to go. I'll do anything to help,'" Regan told the Evansville Courier's Dave Johnson for an article the day before the game.

It was the only appearance Harris made with the basketball team that offseason. But it was far from the only time Harris did good things for people he didn't know in communities he'd never been to. He went on NFL-led military base tours overseas, bought letterman jackets for an inner-city Pittsburgh school that won a state basketball championship and was honored for his work by Pittsburgh's prestigious Dapper Dan Club.

"When you talk about Franco Harris, you're talking about a great humanitarian and a super human being," Regan told the Courier.

And so that's how it came to pass that on a cold Saturday in the darkest winter in Evansville history, Roberts Stadium again found itself bursting with life. The Courier reported 10,746 people turned out to watch a collection of former UE basketball and football players edge the Steelers 42-38.

Wentford Gaines scored 14 points to lead the Steelers. But the star of the show, obviously, was Franco Harris. He made two baskets in the game and showed a proclivity for traveling (a Courier reporter noted that Franco "carried the ball for at least 100 yards" that day).

Harris, after the game, told the Courier he hadn't heard of the University of Evansville until the plane crash happened.

"The most important thing is that we're able to be here and to be together," Harris said.

The article in the archive doesn't mention how much money Franco Harris and the Steelers raised in their trip to Evansville, but the effect was bigger than that for a city in search of healing. It converted a lot of locals to become Steelers fans, a tradition they passed on through the generations.

And it's one reason why, more than 40 years later, when you walk into a sports bar in Evansville on a fall Sunday afternoon, you're almost always going to find someone in a Steelers jersey.

Ryan Reynolds is executive editor of the Courier & Press. You can reach him by email at ryan.reynolds@courierpress.com or follow him on Twitter, @ryanreynolds.

This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: The night Franco Harris brought joy back to Evansville