Hickman deserves a plaque inside Legends Stadium
Wall of Honor - Legends Stadium at Cape was set up from its initial naming to induct new members to a wall of honor, and now with the new brick field house, it is just a perfect place for plaques of coaching legends past to be placed on the wall. Coach Tom Hickman, the father of track at Cape, needs to be inducted now while he is still alive and able to not show up, because I'm sure he won't. I was contacted by Tom's grandson Mathew about Legends Stadium and the better news is I'm going to round up some old school guys to go visit Coach Hickman expecting he may ask me to stay in the car but I know he will be ecstatic to see some of them. Tom was a two-sport All-American at West Chester, soccer and track, before he left for World War II and survived five combat campaigns as a forward observer. Coach Hickman, winner of five state championships at Cape in the beginning years of the school district of the early '70s and now pushing 90, is a very proud person who doesn't enjoy being the old guy and hasn't for the last 30 years. I remember when he received a gold athletic pass from the state on his retirement in 1985 he said, ”I never wanted one of these. All it means is they expect you to die soon.” Another of a thousand Hickman stories I have is when he got about 25 guys from Slaughter Neck to be voting members of the Delaware Sports Hall of Fame at $25 a pop so they could vote for Henry White, whom Hickman got on the ballot. Henry, a Cape star in 1974, led the nation in all-purpose yardage his senior year at Colgate University.
Baseline barbershop - Here are some recorded comments following Cape's dramatic 76-74 basketball win Dec. 13 at Sussex Tech: (Remember, you don't have to be black to get a seat in the baseline barbershop; any Bart Simpson can sit right on down.) “Heck of a game, heck of an effort, the boys played their hearts out. They played a great great basketball game.” I asked the crew if they would have said the same thing if Cape had lost by 2. “I would have said the same thing - they left it all on the court." "They have a guard-oriented team. " "Troy DeShields is a hoss, he's unguardable. If Troy DeShields played at Cape, they would win the state championship.”
Political pressure points - Cape is advertising for a new head coach for field hockey, so let the phone calls begin. I do know that Cape wants this position filled as quickly as possible. And I know that no one speaks for the parents, and if the school board meddles and muddles about and mucks up the recommendation of the interview committee - it has happened in the past in all sports with other school boards with deleterious results - the athletes could pay the price. “Do the right thing,” to quote Spike Lee.
Fly, Eagles, fly - I asked my Eagles media contact if I could bring Mike DeStasio to this Sunday's Jets game and have him sit in the press box with me. Their answer was to send four tickets and a parking pass to the DeStasio family for the special ADA section of the stadium, which is totally handicapped accessible. Mike had agreed to wear an At lanta No. 7 Vick jersey I gave him under his No. 80 Wayne Chrebet jersey. The Eagles do a great job with community outreach stuff, but free tickets or not, the DeStasio clan is all about the “J-E-T-S Jets!”
Snippets - Cape's Shanel Dickens has added the 1,600 to her repertoire of races and has won the event the last two weeks at the Worcester County Recreation Center. On Dec. 14 Shanel won the event in 5:30 over Molly Bliss of Milford at 5:35. Shanel was just accepted to Temple University as a kinesiology major (scientific study of human movement) in the College of Health Professions and Social Work. “Look, I know you're poor, but you still have to stretch before working out.” Shanel now waits to see if the financial package put together by the Owls will enable her to go there. Allie DeStasio, a senior at Cape, has been accepted into the prestigious nursing degree program at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn. Allie is also a prime-time bowler and to my knowledge may be Cape's first woman ever recruited to a Division I University as a kegler - German for a person who bowls, not to be confused with German for a person who drinks beer from a nozzle leading directly to a barrel. I am sometimes known as “Big German Guy.” When I bowled in the Bowling for Scholars teachers' league, I was known as Captain Hook with my dark green garage sale bowling ball, and I was absolutely horrid, but I had the beer part hardwired. Go on now, git!
