[2][3] The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the crash on the pilot's failure to remove gust locks on the right aileron and the rudder before takeoff, as well as an overloaded baggage compartment.

As it was, the extra baggage shifted the plane's center of gravity to the back end, and the locked rudder and aileron made it impossible to control the overweight aircraft.

[4][5] The only member of the Purple Aces who did not die in the crash was 18-year-old freshman David Furr; he was out for the season with an ankle injury and thus was not on the plane that day.

Two weeks after the crash, Furr and his younger brother Byron were killed in a car accident near Newton, Illinois, leaving the entire 1977 Evansville team dead.

Also engraved is an excerpt from the eulogy delivered by school president Wallace Graves at a memorial service: "Out of the agony of this hour we will rise."