NEW ORLEANS – With a room full of friends, former players and media members who covered him for years, former LSU men’s basketball Coach Dale Brown was honored with a lifetime achievement award Friday at the New Orleans Marriott by the United States Basketball Writers Association at their annual awards breakfast.
The event was held as part of the NCAA Final Four festivities taking place here this weekend.
At the breakfast, the Oscar Robertson Player of the Year Award was presented by the USBWA to Anthony Davis of Kentucky and Coach Frank Haith of Missouri won the Henry Iba USBWA Coach of the Year Award.
CBS Sportscaster Tim Brando, who as a young Baton Rouge-New Orleans sportscaster became the first longstanding play-by-play announcer for basketball on the old TigerVision pay-per-view package, introduced Brown with a speech that many times had his voice near cracking because of the emotions.
“The best thing that can possibly be said about this man is he is a tremendous human being who does so much for so many but he is absolutely unafraid to tell people what’s wrong and needs to be done to write that wrong. He only knows one way of saying it and it’s not always going to make everyone happy,” Brando, a native of Shreveport said. “He’s not a politician, but he is a game changer. He’s a life changer. He certainly did that for me.
“I love him more than any other man I have ever known other than my father,” said Brando. “He will always be my mentor. He will forever be my guiding light. I would not be what I am today if it were not for Coach Brown.”
Brown, who coached for 25 years at LSU, won 448 games and took LSU to the NCAA Final Four in 1981 and 1986, used a letter sent to him by legendary Coach John Wooden shortly before he passed away in 2010 to express his thoughts on the award.
“Thanks is a rather simple, one-syllable word that is too often used without feeling, but when used with sincerity, no collection of words can be more meaningful or expressive,” the letter said.
Brown just smiled and said “thanks” to end his remarks.
Longtime Baton Rouge sports writer and television personality Lee Feinswog, helped tell the story of the 1981 and 1986 teams along with some of the former players and staff members.
“We had a lot of chemistry on that team,” recalled 1981 point guard Ethan Martin. “The guys on that team made me because all I had to do was distribute the ball and I looked good. My job was easy. Dale Brown made me a great player because he told me to just give it to DeWayne (Scales) and Rudy (Macklin).”
Ricky Blanton, who bulked up and played center on the 1986 team and who is currently a member of the LSU Sports Radio Network broadcast team, told the crowd: “We all gravitate to the underdog and we were the first 11 seed to make the Final Four. We were a bunch of guys that believed in each other. It was a great run, a memory for life.”
The sentiment expressed most was summed up in one short phrase by Bo Bahnsen, who began as a manager and ended up on the administrative staff of the team and today serves as a senior associate athletic director in the compliance office of the athletic department.
“It’s a family.”
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Coach Brown and former assistant Johnny Jones participated in the Reese’s NABC All-Star Game Friday afternoon in the Louisiana Superdome, overseeing the West squad which lost to Wimp Sanderson and the East team, 103-99. LSU senior Storm Warren played for the West and had six points and three rebounds in 12 minutes.
“It was a great experience – a blessed opportunity – for me to get out here and be able to play,” Warren said to The Advocate. “We just came out, competed a little bit and just had fun.”