Groat’s day is well- deserved
Hall of Fame baseball legend Stan Musial, one of the 10 greatest players of all time in his sport, who also had a basketball scholarship offer from Pitt?
I’m not old enough to have watched Honus Wagner or Josh Gibson, contrary to public opinion. But I do remember Tom Clements, who started at quarterback for three seasons at Notre Dame after turning down a basketball scholarship to North Carolina. I also saw LaVar Arrington, who blew away the competition in football, basketball and track before becoming the greatest athlete in Penn State history, and Terrelle Pryor, the most- hyped high school phenom to come from our little corner of the world.
I would put Arnold Palmer at No. 1 if I considered golf to be a sport instead of an activity and Palmer to be an athlete instead of one of the world’s all- time great showmen. I could go on. I know there’s a good chance I am missing your favorite.
I’m just glad City Council honored Groat and gave me an excuse to build my case for him. I have watched him walk into basketball arenas as Bill Hillgrove’s partner on the Pitt radio broadcasts since 1979 and thought what a shame it is that the kids at the game have no idea who he is. They see an older man now, so frail that you worry that a puff of wind will send him flying. They should walk up to him, shake his hand and find out how sharp he still is, how full of life at 87. They should jump on the internet and do a little research into his sports career. Careers, actually. Groat, born in Wilkinsburg and an athletic wunderkind at Swissvale High School, was a two- time All-American in baseball and basketball at Duke and is in both the college baseball and college basketball Halls of Fame. He played in the NBA. He also was a league MVP, a five- time All- Star and a twotime World Series champion in baseball. Go ahead. Try to find a more impressive resume.
“I was a better basketball player than I ever was a baseball player,” Groat said many times. “Basketball was always my first love.”
Groat’s No. 10 jersey was the first of the 13 that Duke has retired and hangs in the Cameron Indoor Stadium rafters. All these years later, he still ranks No. 2 on Duke’s career scoring average list. He was the Helms National Player of the Year as a junior in 1951 and led the nation in scoring average as a senior in 1952. He scored 48 points against North Carolina in his final collegiate game, the most against a Carolina team.
Groat was the third overall pick of the Fort Wayne Pistons in the 1952 NBA draft and played parts of one season in the league. The team thought so much of him that it offered use of a private plane to get him to more games. He said, “Thanks, but no thanks,” and pursued his baseball career. The Pirates will be forever grateful.
Groat was the National League MVP in 1960, winning the batting title with a .325 average on a Pirates team that stunned the New York Yankees by taking the World Series in seven games. He said again Tuesday that nearly unfathomable accomplishment was his best moment in sports. He would beat the Yankees again in the 1964 Series with the St. Louis Cardinals. Here’s the best part: All of this couldn’t happen to a nicer, kinder, sweeter man.
Two of my favorite Groat memories involve Duke and Pitt, his adopted school. The first happened in 2014 before Duke played its first Atlantic Coast Conference game at Petersen Events Center. Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski and Pitt coach Jamie Dixon met at midcourt to give Groat a souvenir basketball. What a moment. The second happened in late March, when Pitt named former Duke star and assistant coach Jeff Capel as its new head basketball coach. Capel spotted Groat in the audience at his introductory news conference and, realizing what Groat meant to the two schools, gave him a shout- out. Another moving moment.
Groat deserves all the shout- outs he gets.
Way to go, City Council.