I know.
You have heard it over and over and over again.
“Your vote counts.”
“You can make a difference.”
“If you don’t vote now, don’t complain later.”
Nope, not talking city, state or national politics. This is the important stuff — sports!
And yes, “voting matters,” especially in the annual Alaska Sports Hall of Fame balloting.
Sports fans can have their voices heard and make a difference in who the top athletes are in the state: past, present and, well, maybe not future yet.
On Tuesday, the ASHOF announced that the public voting portion to begin the process of selecting the people, moments and events to be inducted into their Class of 2016 is now open.
“One of the cool things, and we see this in Southeast a bit, is that people use the write-in option,” Alaska Sports Hall of Fame Executive Director Harlow Robinson said. “The write-in has become real Alaska tradition. At the end of the day, the public is one-tenth of the poll vote, and the other voting members on the selection committee pay attention to all the write-in nominees.”
Sitka basketball great Herb Didrickson was not on a ballot, neither was Wally Leask.
Word of mouth from fans who witnessed their greatness or experienced the feeling first-hand of having a jump shot being buried or a rebound snatched away by the duo helped rally support. Both are now Alaska Sports Hall of Fame members.
Didrickson (Class of 2013) was a dominant player for Sheldon Jackson Junior College in the 1940s. He went on to become a local legend for the Alaska Native Brotherhood team and became the first player inducted into the Gold Medal Tournament Hall of Fame in 1961. He is called the “Jim Thorpe of Alaska sports.”
Wally Leask (Class of 2009), another Sheldon Jackson star, was “a man ahead of the times” when he played basketball at the University of Washington in the early 1940s, according to a write-up on Leask on the Alaska Sports Hall of Fame website. Alaska Dispatch News Editor Beth Bragg described his ballhandling skills as “light years ahead of the norm, making him the perfect floor-general for Huskies coach Hec Edmundson, who is widely credited for originating fast-break basketball during those years.”
After a few years of being written about in sports pages and finally making a write-in ballot, the Juneau Lion’s Club Gold Medal Basketball Tournament was inducted into the ASHOF as an “Event” in 2012. (The other ASOF “Events” are the Equinox Marathon, the Great Alaskan Shootout, the Iditarod, the Iron Dog, the Midnight Sun Baseball Game, Mount Marathon, WEIO, and the Yukon Quest.)
That honor touched many of the past fathers, sons and grandsons that suited up in the same games and more often than not the same brackets as their ancestors. The aforementioned Didrickson played in the first Gold Medal Basketball Tournament in 1947. The tourney featured many professional-caliber players over its history and finally the recognition of the gathering of family, friends and opponents from many different walks of life and communities was praised before the entire state.
Somewhere out there could be the next such event … or the next Carlos Boozer.
Boozer, a Juneau-Douglas High School graduate and professional hoops great, was inducted in the “People” category in 2008. He is up for a “Moment” nod this year, when he helped Duke win the NCAA title in 2001.
Last year Ketchikan great John Brown, with four straight high school championships (1965-68), was inducted. So was Nancy Pease who won a ton of mountain races in the 1980s and 1990s (she also competed on a few Juneau courses during the summer and winter seasons).
There are some locals already on this year’s ballot.
Geoff Roes, possibly the best ultramarathon racer in the state is on the “People” ballot. He got his start by winning the 2006 Susitna 50-K, and the next year he set a course record in the Susitna 100-miler. In 2008 and 2009, he won the Wasatch 100 Miler, and in 2010 he won the American River 50 Mile Endurance Run and the Western States Endurance Run in record time. Roes also holds the Crow Pass Crossing course record (2:54:44).
Whenever it snows in Juneau we think of Hilary Lindh. Lindh, whose groove started on Eaglecrest, was inducted in 2009 in the “People” category for all the world cup races and wins from age 16 until she retired at 27.
Lindh is up for two “Moment” categories this ballot: The World Championship in 1997 where she was the only American to medal, and it was gold in the women’s downhill in Sestriere, Italy, this after delaying retirement for a year. Lindh is also up for surprising the ski world by winning a silver medal in the women’s downhill at the 1992 Albertville Olympics in France and becoming the first Alaskan to win an individual medal at the Olympics.
Juneau sports fans may also like to know that the Buckwheat Ski Classic, the Klondike Road Relay and the Kluane Bike Race are on the ballot in the “Events” category.
The complete list of selections can be viewed, and voted on, at www.alaskasportshall.org. Click on “Honor” at top and “Vote Now” to see the candidates.
Voting will conclude at midnight, Alaska Time, on Nov. 30.
The accumulative vote of the general public is the equivalent to that of one Selection Panel member according to an ASHOF press release.
The panel is comprised of nine sports-related experts, sports news editors and historians from across the state. The panel members will view the results of the public vote before completing their own ballots at the selection meeting on Dec. 6.
The Class of 2016 will be announced at a press conference in Anchorage on Dec. 7, and the new inductees will be honored at a special 10-Year Celebration event in July 2016 that will also include all previous classes of inductees.
Happy write-ins and voting!
