In February 1897, the university agreed to pay part of Cooke’s salary, and he was employed by the school full-time by the fall of 1897.

Cooke spent a couple of seasons building the program playing smaller schools in the Twin Cities and YMCA teams.

[3][4][5] When the Big Ten began basketball play in 1905, the Gophers were an early power, winning the first two regular season titles.

It was in this capacity that he came into possession of the Little Brown Jug, after Michigan left it behind following a road game against the Gophers football team.

Cooke famously refused to return the trophy to the Wolverines, and the battle for the Little Brown Jug was born.

[10] Mark Hugunin and Stew Thornley’s research disputes several seasons’ results based on box scores and newspaper clippings, and they put Cooke’s career record at 254–142–3, with a .640 winning percentage.

[11] In Gopher Glory, Steve Perlstein lists Cooke’s career record at 245–137–2 (.641), even though this book is published with some corroboration of the university itself.

[8] Accepting any records of these as correct, however, shows the great success that Cooke had at the program, and he is by far the winningest coach in Gophers basketball history.