Willow Glen Resident

Sports

Four new members to join San Jose Hall

By Kevin Sparrer

The highest honor for any athlete is to be inducted a sports Hall of Fame. In November, four new members will be added to the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame for their participation in college, professional and Olympic sports.

The 12th class of inductees to the San Jose Sports Hall of Fame will include Jennifer Azzi, Bill McPherson, Walt McPherson and Mark Spitz, bringing the total number of members to 58.

Azzi was the first three-time All-Pac-10 and two time All-American women's basketball player during her time at Stanford University. In 1990, the year Stanford won the national championship, she was named the Most Valuable Player in the NCAA Final Four tournament and won both the Wade and Naismith trophies, naming her the nation's best player.

Since her time at Stanford, she has played for two U.S world championship teams and was a 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games gold medalist as part of the American team. Azzi was also a member of the founding team for the American Basketball League, the San Jose Lazers. After the league went under, she went on to the Women's National Basketball Association where she played in Detroit, Salt Lake City and San Antonio and became one of the league's deadliest three-point shooters to date.

B. McPherson, who grew up in San Jose, was a standout lineman at Bellarmine Prep and Santa Clara University. He has already been inducted into the Hall of Fame at each school and the weight room at SCU was named in his honor.

After graduating, McPherson turned to coaching and served as a defensive line and linebackers coach for Bellarmine from 1956-1962, at SCU from 1963-1974 and at UCLA from 1975-1977 before moving on to the National Football League. He was with the Philadelphia Eagles in 1978, then joined the San Francisco 49ers staff were he coached from 1979 to 1998, earning five Super Bowl rings. He was also the 49ers director of professional personnel until 2005.

W. McPherson was an outstanding lineman for both San Jose High School and San Jose State in the late 1930s. He became the freshman baseball coach at SJSU in 1939 at the age of 22, where he was the youngest coach in the nation. McPherson went on to coach football, basketball, baseball and golf during his career with the Spartans.

In 1948, his golf team won the NCAA championship and his 1949-50 basketball team ranked 17th in the nation. In 1961-62 he was the athletic director and was the head of the physical education department from 1962 to 1970. He was also commissioner of the West Coast Athletic Conference from 1965 to 1969. He is in SJSU's Hall of Fame for three sports--basketball, football and baseball--and the basketball court has been named in his honor.

Spitz was a star member of the Santa Clara Swim Club in the 1960s when he came to swim for the late, great George Haines. Spitz led Santa Clara High School to three straight Central Coast Section swimming titles from 1966 to 1968 and set many national prep freestyle records. He set 25 American records and won 24 AAU titles.

Spitz won two gold, one silver and one bronze medal in the 1968 Olympic Games held in Mexico City. He left Santa Clara to attend Indiana University where led his team to four NCAA championships. Spitz was the first athlete to ever win seven gold medals in the Olympic Games in one year. In 1972, he set new Olympic records in each of his seven events in Munich. His 11 total medals ties the record for most medals by a U.S. athlete. He also won the 1972 Sullivan Award and the AP Male Athlete of the Year award.

The Hall of Fame induction ceremony will be held in November at the H-P Pavilion. Dinner tickets will be $200 each and may be reserved by calling 408.288.2936. A bronze plaque of each honoree will be mounted in the concourse of the Pavilion.

The annual dinner is hosted by the San Jose Sports Authority and the benefits will go to Special Olympics Silicon Valley Region and high school sports programs.