Worthy Patterson, Bill Corley to Join “Huskies of Honor”

[husky99]

http://courantblogs.com/uconn-men/worthy-patterson-bill-corley-to-join-huskies-of-honor/

 

[husky99]

http://blog.ctnews.com/uconnbasketball/2012/01/26/patterson-corley-entering-huskies-of-honor/

 

[ConnHuskBask]

Who?

And Ben Gordon, Caron Butler, etc. can't make it?

 

[Near Nyack]

Bill Corley was a great basketball player and a wonderful person. He was the first black basketball star at UConn. Bill was a generous teammate and played unselfishly, scoring, passing and rebounding with as much, or more agility as any Husky center of any era. I will always have a picture of him etched in my mind: Corley setting a pick for Wes Bialasouknia at the top of the key and Wes launching pro length threes that only counted for a duce in those days. If you didn't see him play, let me set you straight. Bill Corley is truly worthy of the this honor.

Ask Jim Calhoun who played against him.

 

[MTHusky]

Bill Corley was a great basketball player and a wonderful person. He was the first black basketball star at UConn. Bill was a generous teammate and played unselfishly, scoring, passing and rebounding with as much, or more agility as any Husky center of any era. I will always have a picture of him etched in my mind: Corley setting a pick for Wes Bialasouknia at the top of the key and Wes launching pro length threes that only counted for a duce in those days. If you didn't see him play, let me set you straight. Bill Corley is truly worthy of the this honor.

Ask Jim Calhoun who played against him.

Agreed with everything you said about Bill with the exception of Bill being the first black basketball star at UConn. Worthy Patterson is black also. I was in a few of Bill's classes at UConn and was a great person, always with a smile on his face.

 

[husky99]

These guys are the first golden age of uconn

 

[cohenzone]

Corley was indeed very good. Thin (think Jeremy Lamb) , but could jump out of the building and very athletic and a good shooter who, in those days at 6-7, mostly played around the hoop. He would fit in very well in today's game.

There is one thing about his 51 point game, however. I remember this pretty well. First of all, UNH was lousy, and I think only because of that could the record have been set in the way it was set. His coach, Burr Carlson then in his first of 2 or 3 memorable years as one of the school's least successful coaches, looked up at the clock with under 6 minutes left, and felt that Corley could beat the old record (50 points) that Wes Bialosuknia (my year) had set, mostly on long range bombs, the year earlier. The only thing was, Corley had 27 points at the time. He scored 24 points in the last several minutes, mostly being fed for lay-ups, in an era without a shot clock. Why Carlson thought such a thing was possible in such a short time with Corley at half the record only he could haves said (I guess he knew best) and only an opponent so inept could have been so accommodating.

But Bill was a very good player. He was from Long Island and the story at the time he chose UConn, probably true, was that he was from the same home town as Duke (sorry) superstar Art Heyman who had been recruited to Duke by former Duke asst. coach Fred Shabel who had gone on to become UConn's head coach -0ne of our best. Supposedly Shabel enlisted Heyman to convince Corley to pick UConn. Shabel's 4 years at UConn matched my own 4 years and he left to head the Spectrum in Philadelphia where the 76ers played. BTW, because he came out of Duke, Uconn often used Duke's signature 2 handed floor slap on D. But no flops, it was pre-Duke's flopping coach.

 

[Palatine]

I saw Corley play. Tall, slender, jumping bean, he played mostly center. Very athletic. He went on to play with the Harlem Wizards(?) a globetrrotter knock off.

In 1974 or there abouts, an off-season traveling New York Football Giants basketballteam, including Vinny Clements, played an exhibition against a UConn alumni team at the field house. On the opening jump ball, Corley tipped it to Kimbal who tipped it down the floor to someone who dunked. You could sense the Giants looking at Clements and thinking WTF have you gotten us into? The alumni just killed the Giants.

 

[Danzz]

Bill Corley was a great basketball player and a wonderful person. He was the first black basketball star at UConn. Bill was a generous teammate and played unselfishly, scoring, passing and rebounding with as much, or more agility as any Husky center of any era. I will always have a picture of him etched in my mind: Corley setting a pick for Wes Bialasouknia at the top of the key and Wes launching pro length threes that only counted for a duce in those days. If you didn't see him play, let me set you straight. Bill Corley is truly worthy of the this honor.

Ask Jim Calhoun who played against him.

Save your breath, 80% of the posters on this board think basketball was invented in 1985. Corely was outstanding.

 

[bertieboy]

In the 1967-68 season we played Texas Christian University in the old field house and I was there. Corley was the star of the team but the supporting cast wasn't too good as we finished 11-13. But TCU had done their scouting quite well and adopted an unusual defense. Five men in a zone around Corley. And it was a tight zone as those players were never too far from Bill. Even he could not overcome this strategy and we lost, 72-65. If any of you were there for this one, let's hear how you saw it!

Regarding an earlier comment about Burr Carlson being the least successful coach, that sure is the case. He coached for 2 years with records of 11-13 and 5-19. But I don't lay all the blame at his doorstep. I blame our president, Homer Babbage, for most of it.

Shabel arrived on campus for the 1963-64 season. His first recruiting class included Wes Bialosukinia who was on the freshman team in 1963-64. I think Babbage started at about the same time or a little earlier. Being a dyed in the wool Ivy Leaguer and Yalie to boot it is my feeling that he de-emphasized athletics at Uconn and hampered Shabel's recruiting efforts, and that's why Shabel left after only 4 years. Nevertheless, his coaching career at Uconn was not going to be a long one. He wasn't devoted to coaching like Calhoun is [he wanted to be in administration, perhaps athletic director] and the job didn't pay millions like it does today. Any else have an opinion on this?

 

[Robertelamin]

1990 more likely. I never saw either but congrats to them.

 

[mauconnfan]

Saw Corley play with my dad and bro' at the Field House, a special player for those days and a player I'm sure many majors wished had goone to their place after he played in Storrs. I didn't realize he had died, obviously fairly young, but I had fun as a young fan watching him and Balosuknia play, it was an honor that I was able.

Heard some stories about Worthie from someone too and he was also a very good player who somehow ended up at Storrs. Congrats to both!!

 

[cohenzone]

Shabel arrived on campus for the 1963-64 season. His first recruiting class included Wes Bialosukinia who was on the freshman team in 1963-64. I think Babbage started at about the same time or a little earlier. Being a dyed in the wool Ivy Leaguer and Yalie to boot it is my feeling that he de-emphasized athletics at Uconn and hampered Shabel's recruiting efforts, and that's why Shabel left after only 4 years. Nevertheless, his coaching career at Uconn was not going to be a long one. He wasn't devoted to coaching like Calhoun is [he wanted to be in administration, perhaps athletic director] and the job didn't pay millions like it does today. Any else have an opinion on this?[/quote]

I don't know that Babbidge de-emphasized sports. He certainly emphasized academics. He was easily the best president UConn ever had. Herbst is showing some good signs as well. Babbidge left after 10 years because he had said when he came in that he did not believe in staying more than ten years. it was not a good thing that he left. I was lucky enough to be in his close presence on several occasions being involved in student politics, and to this day, I count him among the tippety top of outstanding people I've met. As for Burr Carlson, he seemed to be able to de-emphasize basketball without anyone's help.

 

[MTHusky]

In the 1967-68 season we played Texas Christian University in the old field house and I was there. Corley was the star of the team but the supporting cast wasn't too good as we finished 11-13. But TCU had done their scouting quite well and adopted an unusual defense. Five men in a zone around Corley. And it was a tight zone as those players were never too far from Bill. Even he could not overcome this strategy and we lost, 72-65. If any of you were there for this one, let's hear how you saw it!

Regarding an earlier comment about Burr Carlson being the least successful coach, that sure is the case. He coached for 2 years with records of 11-13 and 5-19. But I don't lay all the blame at his doorstep. I blame our president, Homer Babbage, for most of it.

Shabel arrived on campus for the 1963-64 season. His first recruiting class included Wes Bialosukinia who was on the freshman team in 1963-64. I think Babbage started at about the same time or a little earlier. Being a dyed in the wool Ivy Leaguer and Yalie to boot it is my feeling that he de-emphasized athletics at Uconn and hampered Shabel's recruiting efforts, and that's why Shabel left after only 4 years. Nevertheless, his coaching career at Uconn was not going to be a long one. He wasn't devoted to coaching like Calhoun is [he wanted to be in administration, perhaps athletic director] and the job didn't pay millions like it does today. Any else have an opinion on this?

It was my understanding that Shabel left when he wasn't appointed AD at UConn.

 

[Waquoit]

Congrats to Bill and Worthy. I'm looking forward to being part of the standing O. And Shabel was the 2nd best men's basketball coach at UConn.

 

[bertieboy]

Shabel was the third best. 1. Calhoun, 2. Hugh Greer, 3. Shabel.