Billy Arnold (born 1940s) is an American former basketball player known for his college career at the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

during the 1960s. A native of Haltom City, Texas, Arnold was an all-state player for Haltom High School before enrolling at Texas in the fall of 1964. Due to

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...

player eligibility rules at the time, freshmen could not play varsity basketball, so Arnold did not begin his career for the Longhorns until his

sophomore In the United States, a sophomore ( or ) is a person in the second year at an educational institution; usually at a secondary school or at the college and university level, but also in other forms of post-secondary educational institutions. In ...

season in 1965–66. In his three seasons, Arnold appeared in 66 games and averaged 13.3 points and 2.3 rebounds per game. His best year came in 1967–68, his senior season, in which he averaged 19.9 points and 3.4 rebounds per game while leading Texas to a second-place finish in the

Southwest Conference The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference included schools from Oklahoma an ...

(SWC). Arnold led the conference in scoring and was named to the All-SWC First Team while also being honored as the SWC Player of the Year. Arnold did not pursue a professional career. Shortly after graduating from Texas in 1968, he was tapped to be the newest head boys' basketball coach for Elgin High School in

Elgin, Texas Elgin ( ) is a city in Bastrop County in the U.S. state of Texas. The population was 9,784 at the 2020 census. Elgin is also known as the Sausage Capital of Texas and the Brick Capital of the Southwest, due to the presence of three operating bri ...

References

1940s births Living people American men's basketball players Basketball players from Tarrant County, Texas Guards (basketball) High school basketball coaches in Texas Texas Longhorns men's basketball players {{1940s-US-basketball-bio-stub