Spartans’ Horne starred on the basketball court

As a freshman at Lorain Catholic, Michael Horne believed by the time he and his basetball teammates were seniors, they would get to the state finals, and sure enough, that’s exactly where the 1975-76 Spartans ended up.

“I told Coach (Jim Lawhead) when we were freshmen that by the time we were seniors we’d be in the state championship, and it came true,” Horne said.

Lorain Catholic lost, 8281, to Dayton Roth in the Class AA boys basketball championship that year after winning 25 straight games, but that didn’t

diminish Horne’s outstanding career in three years as a Spartan.

Horne started as a sophomore, setting a season record with 207 points, and continued as a starter for 69 consecutive games during his career, totaling 1,072 career points while being named to the All-Ohio tournament first team, averaging 27.5 points per game.

“Mike Horne was arguably one of the finest shooting point guards in Lorain County history,” Lawhead said in his nomination of Horne to the Lorain Sports Hall of Fame.

Horne will officially be inducted into the hall on May 4 and said it’s an honor to be included with players he looked up to. “It’s a very nice honor,” Horne said.

“It’s something as a kid growing up in Lorain, you strive to do some of the best things, do the right things throughout your career, and we had a lot of success with basketball and the teams I played on and it’s a nice award.

“I watched some great players growing up that were my role models as I was coming up, and to be honored in the Lorain Sports Hall of Fame with those people that I watched is a great honor I’m looking forward to.”

Horne credits much of his individual success as a player to his Lorain Catholic teammates.

“We had a fantastic team,” Horne said. “A group of guys, all from different parts of Lorain, (and) we kind of combined as freshmen and had immediate success. With all of the basketball players from those particular schools, once we put that together, it was pretty awesome to be a part of.

“We played as a team, unselfish, and everyone liked each other, which contributed to winning a lot of games.”

After high school, Horne attended Henderson County Junior College in Texas where he played basketball from 1981 to 1983.

After receiving a bachelor’s degree in education from Cleveland State, Horne was employed as a teacher in the Firelands school district, where he joined the coaching ranks.

Horne was named Lorain County Conference Coach of the Year in the 1991-92 season and received back-to-back Lorain County Division II Coach of the Year honors from 1991 to 1993.