Last week, former NC State basketball coach and athletics director Les Robinson joined his two heroes (“Hot” Rod Hundley and Jerry West), his mentor (former Wolfpack head coach Everett Case) and one of his former players (East Tennessee State player Keith “Mister” Jennings) with his selection for the Southern Conference Hall of Fame.
Robinson’s selection as a special contributor was for his accomplishments as a basketball coach and athletics director at Southern Conference schools The Citadel and East Tennessee State, and for his overall contributions to the 12-member conference.
His selection had nothing to do with his work at NC State, a charter member of the league that was founded in 1921. The Wolfpack was a member for the first 33 of the league’s 97 years.
Since its Hall of Fame’s inception in 2009, the Southern Conference has selected just one NC State-affiliated member, the legendary Case, who brought big-time basketball to the South. So far, no former NC State athlete has been selected.
This is not a complaint, of course, just an observation. Obviously, the SoCon is more concerned about athletes of its current members, not those that left the original conference, first in 1932, when the Southeastern Conference was formed, and in 1953, when NC State and six other members left to form the Atlantic Coast Conference.
However, as the league approaches its centennial celebration, here are my unsolicited suggestions for former NC State athletes and coaches who at least merit consideration for the league’s decade-old hall of fame.
Jack McDowall, football, basketball, baseball and track: A native of Florida who spent one year in Rockingham, N.C., before enrolling at NC State, “Spindle Legs” McDowall was a key contributor to the only Wolfpack football team to win a Southern Conference championship.
That 1927 title was secured when McDowall intercepted a pass and ran it back 75 yards against Florida, his home-state team that rejected him for being too small.
McDowall won 11 athletic letters in his athletic career, and is the only person in school history to win two Norris Cups, given by the student body to the school’s top athlete. He was selected as the school’s top athlete of its first half-century in 1939.
His on-the-field exploits and a long athletics administration and coaching career at Rollins College earned him induction into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1975 and into the NC State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2014.
Dick Dickey, basketball: The native of Rigdon, Ind., caught Case’s eye while playing for the California Preflight All-Stars, a military team Case coached during World War II. Dickey followed the former Indiana high school coach to Raleigh in 1946.
The 6-foot-1 forward with a flashy one-handed running jump shot is the only player in NC State history to be named all-conference four consecutive years. He led the Wolfpack to four straight Southern Conference titles and to the 1950 NCAA semifinals (now Final Four), where the Pack finished third.
Dickey finished his career as the top scorer in school history with 1,644 points. He was drafted by the NBA’s Baltimore Bullets and played professionally with the Anderson (Indiana) Packers of the National Professional Basketball League and the Boston Celtics for one season each. He was selected to both the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame (2005) and the NC State Athletic Hall of Fame (2014).
Sammy Ranzino, basketball: Also from Indiana, Ranzino was a teammate of Dickey’s for three seasons, earning All-America honors as a senior in 1951 and three All-Southern Conference selections, while helping the Wolfpack win four consecutive league titles. He quickly broke Dickey’s career scoring record, finishing with 1,967 points, a record that stood until David Thompson broke it in 1975.
Ranzino played one season of professional basketball for the Rochester Royals, then returned to Indiana to become coach of the Frankfort Hot Dogs, the high school team Case made famous.
He eventually returned to North Carolina, where he worked as a school administrator for more than 30 years. He was inducted into the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame in 1982.
Alex Webster, football: “Big Red,” as Webster was known during his Wolfpack football career, was the Southern Conference’s leading scorer during his junior season with 78 points and one of the league’s top players in 1952 as a senior.
He was drafted in the 11th round of the 1953 NFL draft by the Washington Redskins, but chose to play for two seasons in the Canadian Football League. He returned to the NFL for the New York Giants and had a stellar career for several of the Giants’ best teams in history, including the 1956 NFL Championship squad. In 10 seasons, Webster was twice named to the Pro Bowl and appeared in a total of six NFL championship games.
After years as an assistant, Webster was named head coach of the Giants in 1969 and was named the 1970 United Press International NFL Coach of the Year. He was selected for the Giants’ Ring of Honor in 2011 and his No. 29 jersey is honored in the franchise’s Legacy Club.
Willis Casey, swimming: Hired during the same summer as Case to lead the Wolfpack swimming program, Casey was one of the most successful coaches in any sport in Southern Conference history. He won 11 Southern and Atlantic Coast Conference championships as a coach and never had a losing season. He coached 33 All-Americans and four individual national champions before becoming the schools athletics director in 1969.
As an administrator, he served as the tournament manager for the Southern Conference basketball tournaments and the Dixie Classics held at Reynolds Coliseum. He was inducted into the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame in 1985, shortly after he announced his retirement as NC State’s athletics director, and will be a 2018 inductee into the NC State Athletic Hall of Fame.
Tim Peeler is a regular contributor to The Wolfpacker and can be reached at tmpeeler@ncsu.edu.
