I have seen and heard of a few names being added to our “Wall of Fame” around our practice court. Which names do you believe should be on that wall?
I will start my list from PSJ, since that was 3rd to 5th grade for me, going to the beginning of the Sampson era.
Rob Williams
Dream
Glide
Michael Young
Larry Micheaux
Bennie Anders
Ricky Winslow
Cadillac Anderson
Craig Upchurch
Sam Mack
Bo Outlaw
Anthony Goldwire
Tim Moore
Damon Jones
Andre Owens
Aubrey Coleman
Robert “Fluff” McKiver
It’s OK to have a completely subjective list of famous UH basketball players. I don’t have any objection at all to anyone on this list (and I’ve seen all of them play). But what is the criteria for fame? We’ve had team MVP types like Reid Gettys, Galen Robinson, Junior, Jamal Shead, Rob Gray, and Lanny Smith who were “famous” contributors especially if you count “culture guys” rather than just top points per game scorers. And we have also had other players who were “famous” in sort of a notorious way, such as Chicken Knowles, Kevin Gaines, and Tree Adeife.
Since a practice court has four sides, which also means it has four walls, perhaps we need different sorts of walls of fame to highlight the different paths to fame (or infamy) that Cougar basketball players have trod.
Gary Phillips
Elvin Hayes
Don Chaney
Ollie Taylor
Dwight Jones
Louis Dunbar
Otis Birdsong
I may be in the minority, but I would not have Bennie Anders on the Wall of Fame. He was more of a personality, and was never a feature player. Most of his UH career, he never even started.
I went to Milby and was a Tim Moore fan, but I don’t remember him contributing significantly at UH or living up to his billing. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
It’s tough to find the balance between too few and too many. Living in Dallas most of my life, I’ll use their teams for examples.
For most of its existence, it was tougher to get in the Cowboys Ring of Honor than the NFL Hall of Fame.
OTOH The Mavs retired Brad Davis’ number. Even Ro Blackman and Dereck Harper are questionable. But having Dirk by himself makes it tough to market the team history.
Dwight Davis, Poo Welch, Ken Spain. Mel “Savage” Bell could have been one of the top five players to ever play here had it not been for that severe knee injury.
Same for Lee Canalito in football.
I say certainly is appropriate to use scrutiny for a “real wall of fame” (ie in FC).
But at the practice facility, honor any favorite you want. Benny? YES! Heck, put Ryan Elvin up there. There, call it “Coogs Family” or something like that (not 'wall of fame").
Each approach seems fine to me depending on WHERE (and who it is for).
Since I was there for EVERY practice Tim participated in, I’ll have to respectfully disagree with this statement. I know who put the extra work in and who didn’t during his years. I also know who was allowed to play even when they didn’t do the things the coaches asked them to do…
The second team beat the first team in practice every day, for over 6 weeks straight, during one of those years. If anything there was far more latitude given than there should have been.
