He arrived to Springfield’s Hillcrest High School in 1963 with the basketball court understandably pulling on his heart strings. You see, Jim Vaughan had been a three-sport athlete in high school and a collegiate basketball player, too. However, contracts with Springfield Public Schools allowed teachers to coach only two sports, and he had already signed… Read more »
News
Sport: Basketball
Patty Viverito
At the time of her induction in 2014, Patty Viverito was in her 22nd year as senior associate commissioner at the Missouri Valley Conference and he 29th year as commissioner of the Missouri Valley Football Conference. The league, which sponsored nine women’s sports and FCS football, saw its women’s programs merge with their MVC men’s counterparts in… Read more »
Mechelle Voepel
Mechelle Voepel has covered women’s basketball since 1984, when she began her journalism career at the University of Missouri, graduating from there with a degree in journalism in 1987. She joined ESPN.com in 1996 as a women’s college and pro basketball writer, and since has also covered additional college sports. She has covered both the… Read more »
Norman Wagner
Norman Wagner was born in St. Louis and graduated from Normandy High School. As a student-athlete, he lettered at the University of Missouri in basketball and baseball from 1931 to 1933. He led the basketball team in scoring in 1933 when he won all-Big Six Conference honors. His biggest accomplishments, though, were achieved on the… Read more »
Melford Waits
Melford D. Waits was a standout basketball player at Tarkio College in Missouri where he is most known for being the team captain and a 1st Team All- America of the 1940 Tarkio National Association of Intercollegiate Basketball Championship team. He was inducted to the Tarkio College Athletic Hall of Fame in 1987 and later… Read more »
Al Waller
Coach Al Waller was head coach of the men’s basketball team at College of the Ozarks for 25 years before his retirement in 2002. During his tenure at the school, he amassed 458 wins, 12 conference championships, twelve 20 plus win seasons and six trips to the NAIA Division II National tournament with three Elite… Read more »
Walnut Grove High School Girls Basketball Program
In the fall of 1973, girls basketball officially joined Walnut Grove High School’s athletic department and, brick by brick, a path led to small victories here and there. And now? Well, the gym is decorated in banners – many touting the success of the Lady Tigers – while the trophy case out in the hallway… Read more »
Jack R. Watkins, Jr.
Talk about paying your dues and earning respect. In 1992, the Missouri Valley Conference’s headquarters sought a media relations director. And the guy who years earlier as a high school senior served as a copy editor and page designer at the Sikeston Standard-Democrat — and who in college worked in the University of Missouri’s Sports… Read more »
Michael Watson
Thanks to Bo Jackson (MSHOF 2005), the basketball world almost never knew about Michael Watson. Watson admits that football and baseball, not basketball, were his first sports loves growing up in Kansas City. And the multi-talented Jackson was the reason why. “Bo knows football, right?” Watson asked playfully. “I love football simply because you can… Read more »
Harry Weber
Walk outside Busch Stadium in St. Louis or around Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, and you’ll see his work. Or, drive to the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in Springfield, where you’ll find his largest collection. That is, a collection of bronze busts and statues. For Harry Weber, call it all a labor of love… Read more »
Herb Webster
For the last 45 years, Coach Webster has been doing what he loves, coaching basketball to young people. His coaching career started at Tri-County High School. He then moved to Penney High School, where he started the first girls’ basketball team. During his five years, his team won district titles four times and included an… Read more »
“Red” Weir
Harold “Red” Weir was raised in Fayette, Missouri, and was a member of the 1950 Central College basketball team that finished third in the NAIS national tournament. He became a high school coach in Stockton and Eldon, officiating when his team was not playing. Weir joined Snowden-Mize Sporting Goods Co., came to Columbia in the… Read more »
Don West
What a way to start a career – and without really meaning to. For Don West, his sports broadcasting career basically began over a game of poker. You see, he and a friend, not long after their 1985 graduation, decided while playing poker to do a next-day mock broadcast of an American Legion baseball game… Read more »
Rita West
She was among the trailblazers in women’s sports in the early 1970s, playing volleyball, basketball, field hockey and tennis for the University of Missouri-St. Louis. And when racquetball piqued her interest, she not only excelled but soon created a national professional league for women – and then promoted the sport along with Anheuser-Busch. Years later,… Read more »
Jojo White
White was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the son of a minister. He played college basketball at the University of Kansas, entering the NCAA Tournament and losing a double overtime thriller to Texas Western, currently known as the University of Texas at El Paso, in the Midwest regional final. After college, White played on the… Read more »
D. C. “Dixie” Wilcutt
After starring at St. Louis University, Wilcutt was selected in the 1948 BAA Draft by the St. Louis Bombers. He played for the Bombers for two seasons. The first year they were in the Basketball Association of America. That league then combined with the National Basketball League to form the modern-day National Basketball Association, which… Read more »