Two state basketball champions, a college football coach and baseball manager will be included in the Jefferson County Sports Hall of Fame on April 25 at the Pine Bluff Convention Center arena:
Joe Ball won his first state title as a basketball coach at White Hall in 1966. Following stops at Carlisle High and Pine Bluff’s Belair Junior High, Ball was an assistant at Pine Bluff High, helping the Zebras win an overall state championship in 1977 and AAAAA state title in 1979. As head coach, his 1989-90 Zebras led by Ken Biley won the AAAA state and overall championships, finishing 27-3 and ranked 12th by USA Today.
Ellis “Chief” Berry spent 42 years in the Dollarway School District as a football and basketball coach. He was an assistant on all five of the Cardinals’ state football championship teams (1988-93) and head boys basketball coach from 1991-2017, winning more than 400 games and leading three of his teams (1996, 2006 and 2013) to the state final. The 2005-06 Cardinals won the Class AAA state championship.
Frank Lucchesi, who died in 2019, managed the Pine Bluff Judges in the Cotton States League and later became manager of the Philadelphia Phillies and Texas Rangers in the 1970s. He was also the Chicago Cubs’ manager in 1987. Lucchesi met his wife, Catherine Menotti, at Pine Bluff’s Taylor Field. They were married 65 years at the time of his death.
Harold Tilley became Pine Bluff High’s head football coach in 1972 and led the 1977 Zebras to a tie for the AAAAA state championship. (The classification did not have a playoff format until merging with AAAA in 1983.) The next year, he became head coach at the University of Arkansas at Monticello, and in 1979 his Boll Weevils won the Arkansas Intercollegiate Conference championship. Tilley, who coached at UAM through the 1984 season, died in 2018.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
OTHER AWARDS
Three men will be honored with Lifetime Achievement Awards:
Mike Drewett, Pine Bluff Parks and Recreation Director from 1992-2000 who was involved in building and funding for the Waterfront Facility, Saracen RV Park, handicap fishing pier, bowhunters archery range, Harbor Oaks Golf Club and Restaurant and the Regional Park baseball field. The Chicago White Sox drafted Drewett in 1970.
Pinchback Taylor Sr. is the namesake for Taylor Field, the historic baseball park on 16th Avenue and Pennsylvania Street in Pine Bluff. He acquired the land and paid $900 in back taxes before donating it to the city to ensure a clear title. Taylor Field has been home to the Pine Bluff Judges in the 1940s and 1950s and the Pine Bluff Locomotives in 1996.
Winfred Smith was involved with the Pine Bluff Braves semipro baseball team for 40 years as a player, coach and general manager. Smith took a team of current and former collegiate players to the National Baseball Congress World Series tournament in Wichita, Kan., at the end of each summer season. Smith, who died in 2016, played baseball at UAPB.
The Jim Hill Lifetime Umpire Award will be presented to Eddie Bryan. He worked baseball, basketball and football as an official and was inducted into the Arkansas Officials Hall of Fame in 2003, the year he passed away. Bryan also umpired 12 Southwest Regional tournaments and 16 straight Babe Ruth Baseball World Series.
The 1959 Pine Bluff High baseball team will be honored as one of the county’s greatest teams. This ballclub was the first of the school’s 10 state baseball championship teams.
Tickets for the JCSHOF induction will go on sale in February.
Disclaimer: I.C. Murrell is a member of the Jefferson County Sports Hall of Fame committee. Details on each inductee were contributed by members of the committee.