It’s Valentine’s Day and McLaughlin’s Boulevard in final ‘Pros vs. Joes’ tally
Darnell Valentine doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about college basketball, other than keeping tabs on Kansas, his alma mater.
The day I got the best of Barney — and inspired his career game
By Bob Robinson
(Editor’s note: Robinson, now 87, wrote sports for Oregon newspapers for 42 years, the last 37 at The Oregonian. “Robbie” was the paper’s beat writer for the Trail Blazers when they won the NBA championship in 1977. The Central High and U of O grad was a renowned golf writer at The Oregonian and is the author of four books.)
When Barney Holland died on July 21 at 89, it brought a flood of memories to sports followers in Oregon — including me.
During a long high school basketball coaching career at Lebanon, North Eugene and Aloha, the
former University of Oregon athlete compiled a record of 406-224 (.644) and won three state championships and seven league titles.
Holland earned several individual awards, too, including McDonald’s National Coach of the Year selection in 1977 after his North Eugene team won the second of back-to-back state AAA titles and lost only one of 54 games over two seasons, with All-American Danny Ainge leading the way.
Fronk was one of Oregon’s great athletes, ‘and the kind of person to match’
Bob Fronk was easy-going, smart, inquisitive, competitive and, among other things, one heck of an athlete.
Most of those traits are indisputable, especially the last one, as those who watched Fronk — who died in Portland Thursday at age 62 — play sports in the late 1970s and early ‘80s.
Fronk, however, was not lucky.
On shoddy officiating, COVID’s impact and Pac-12 women’s hoops, along with a little Terry Stotts and Charles Barkley …
Reflections from ye old scribe on a few sporting subjects …
• I’m rarely one to criticize sports officials. I have friends who are referees and admire their integrity and intestinal fortitude. I umpired and refereed during my high school and college years. I believe those who work college and pro sports most often do a very credible job.
But what happened Saturday night in Seattle was nothing short of a travesty.
On Cliff Robinson, Another one gone before his time From the early ‘90s Blazers …
Cliff Robinson’s death Friday at the age of 53 leaves another gaping hole in the heart of Rip City.
In 2008, Kevin Duckworth died of congestive heart failure. He was 44.
In 2015, Jerome Kersey passed away from the effects of a blood clot. He was 52.