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Saturday, July 22, 2006
Valvano’s legacy is hope
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
The voice came crackling clear off the recorder. Bell-ringing, vibrant, full of vigor, though it would be stilled two months later. It was Jim Valvano accepting the Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award 13 years ago, already deep into his personal bout with cancer. In effect, he was setting the table for “The V Foundation.”
“Never give up,” he said. Booming. “Never, never give up!”
Well, Valvano didn’t but the vicious cancer took him anyway. Now, a few days ago, it was “Jimmy V Never Give Up Foundation Day” on this radio network, to which I had just casually tuned in. It was a flashback. The N.C. State basketball coach had flown to New Jersey to receive the Ashe Award, and his acceptance was more than a speech, it was a challenge, more powerful than Valvano could have ever imagined. The voice would have shattered chandeliers, brought tears to your eyes. He told the story of his first coaching job, freshman coach at Rutgers.
“Vince Lombardi was my hero. I was 21 and most of my players were 19, and I was sending them out charged up. I was sending them out to play for Rutgers, our first game, and I was adapting Coach Lombardi’s values to us. ‘When you go out there tonight, you are playing for faith, family and the Green Bay Packers,’ I said.” Oops! He laughed at his gaffe.
After his supplication he almost broke his arm trying to crash through a door that was supposed to be unlocked but wasn’t. Rutgers lost.
Twenty years ago, when Bobby Dodd went to N.C. State to present the Dodd Coach of the Year Award to Dick Sheridan, Valvano came by unannounced for a visit with the Georgia Tech coach at his hotel. They had never met. Valvano wanted to know this man, and in the couple of hours that ensued both came to know each other. It was a riveting exchange of two great men who would never meet again. It should have been recorded, but alas, there was no recorder in the room.
There have been few like Valvano. A sports writer’s friend. He arose at dawn one time in Atlanta to be interviewed over breakfast, still in his pajama top. If there was anything he wasn’t, it was dull. If you’ll recall the picture of him flying down the court to swoop in on his players after they had upset the greatly favored Houston Cougars and won the NCAA championship in Albuquerque, that was the Valvano you want in memory. Vibrant. Full of life.
The V Foundation is still very much alive. A fund-raising golf tournament is played around the country. Play in it and you get a shirt with “Jimmy V Foundation” across the chest. I have one. I’m proud of it. I’m proud of another thing, a coincidence. I’m proud that when he was inducted into the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame in 1995, my name was included in his class, along with Bill Dooley, Ted Brown and John Lucas. Jim’s brother Bob, now a broadcaster in Louisville, stood in for him.
Jim had plans. “I don’t know how much time I have left,” he said during his acceptance speech, “but I plan to be back here next year and present the Arthur Ashe award to the next recipient.”
Sadly, he didn’t make it. It turned out he had only two months left, but he left his indelible mark, “The V Foundation,” later created in his honor by friends and admirers who refuse to give up.
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