Today, rather than focus on the heavier news, I am thinking back to 1964, the year before I entered college at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Sports was my main passion and U-M had a basketball player named Cazzie Russell.
When I saw him play in person I was mesmerized. He was a great ball-handler and seemingly could shoot and score from anywhere. When I joined the staff of The Michigan Daily as a sports writer, I covered him, and interviewed him after he scored his 2,000th point.
This was the era before the three-point shot, or Russell would have racked up many more points than the 27.1 he averaged per game during his three-year college career. His final point total 2,164, is the fifth-highest in school history, but the other four players had four year careers, not three. To this day he is tied for the single-game scoring record at 48, in a game that I covered.
As Wikipedia documents: “Along with Bill Buntin, Russell led the Wolverines to three consecutive Big Ten Conferencetitles (1964–66) and to Final Four appearances in 1964 and 1965, losing in the final game 91-80 to defending national champion UCLA and John Wooden in 1965.”
He also was a star in the NBA for many years.
In person, Cazzie was exceedingly modest, so soft-spoken you had to listen carefully to pick up what he was saying in the boisterous post-game locker room. Overall, he was one of my first true heroes, combining strength with grace, beauty and modesty.
Sort of like poetry in motion.
(This is an excerpt from an essay in February 2021.)
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