THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, February 6, 1995 TAG: 9502060150
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JIM DUCIBELLA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 102 lines
It has been nearly 12 years since Anne Donovan was the center of the women's basketball universe; 12 years since she led Old Dominion to a Final Four; 12 years since she became the first woman to win the Naismith Trophy as national player of the year; 12 years since she was an All-American for a third and final time.
Twelve years. Hundreds of thousands of players have had their chance to blot out her accomplishments. And still, after every game played at the ODU field house, children congregate outside the locker room, waiting for her to appear.
Some of that is mere curiosity. At 6-feet-8, Donovan remains the tallest person ever involved with Lady Monarchs basketball. Kids like to look.
But it's more than that. Each day, ODU's athletic department receives a small bundle of letters and cards addressed to Donovan. And they aren't from high schoolers she's recruiting in her job as an assistant coach.
People remember Donovan for a variety of reasons, all of them right.
Some remember that she scored an ODU-record 2,719 points and grabbed 1,976 rebounds.
Some recall that she blocked 801 shots - still an NCAA record.
Others know that she was a three-time member of the U.S. Olympic team; that when the Americans chose to compete in 1984 and '88, Donovan was instrumental in the team striking gold.
Finally, they recall that she helped ODU to the 1980 AIAW national championship, paced the United States to a gold medal in the 1986 World Championship Games, and last year joined John Wooden and Bill Walton in the GTE/CoSIDA Academic Hall of Fame.
Today folks may get yet another reason to remember Donovan. She is one of 11 finalists for enshrinement in the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass. Twenty-four members of the Honors Committee recently voted on this year's class. Donovan needs 18 votes for selection.
``It would be such a thrill for me because that would mean that people recognized what I contributed,'' she said. ``It would be easy to vote in someone who averaged 30 points a game. But for someone like me to be voted in, people will have to take time to study what I meant to my teams.''
Donovan remembers her first day on the court in high school in New Jersey. Gangly and painfully shy, she was shooting layup after layup when coach Rose Battaglia entered the gym.
Battaglia immediately demanded that Donovan move away from the hoop, that she hone the game's other required skills. Those instructions became a metaphor for Donovan's life.
``It forced me to come out of my shell,'' she said. ``It would have been easy for me to just stand there and shoot layups. Basketball gave me a sense of comfort; a mini-family. The development of my self-confidence as a person came about through the game.''
Because of Donovan's height advantage, the tendency was to think that her basketball conquests came easily. They didn't.
Under Battaglia and, later, under Lady Monarchs coach Marianne Stanley, Donovan labored hours fine-tuning her game. She developed a dazzling arsenal of weapons, including short jumpers from both sides of the basket and baby hooks. She was deadly accurate from the free-throw line.
At the other end, she was the game's dominant force. Donovan averaged 200 blocked shots per season.
``The good Lord blessed me with great height, but not much else,'' she said. ``I had a great work ethic and the realization that it was going to take a lot of hard work to get where I wanted. Yes, I was a little closer to the rim, but there's a lot more to the game than that.''
In 1988, Donovan made her last competitive appearance. She was 26, five years removed from college and straining just to stay a member of the U.S. Olympic team.
Although she was named co-captain following the Olympic Trials, that responsibility had been bestowed upon her when it appeared she might be of some use to the team. But it became increasingly apparent during practice sessions in Seoul, South Korea, that the skills of the other players dwarfed hers. By the fourth game, ``Grandma,'' as her teammates nicknamed her, had plunged from starter to one of the last players off the bench.
The gold-medal game featured the United States and Yugoslavia. It began badly for the Americans. The Yugoslavs featured a 6-10 center no one had stopped.
With the United States behind near the end of the first half, Donovan was inserted. She immediately blocked two shots, scored several baskets and contributed a couple of steals.
She continued her performance at the start of the second half, bewildering her foes. After the United States captured the gold medal, Olympic officials approached ``Grandma'' about staying in shape for the '92 Games.
She declined, although she helps out as a member of the Olympic Advisory Committee.
Donovan hopes the voters remembered that when they made their selections. But she swears the only impact today's voting will have on her life is to determine whether ``it is a good day or a great day.''
Only those comfortable enough with greatness to live without it say such things. And mean it. ILLUSTRATION: TAMARA VONINSKI/Staff
Election to the Basketball Hall of Fame ``would be such a thrill for
me because that would mean that people recognized what I
contributed,'' said Anne Donovan, who is still with the ODU program
as an assistant coach.
KEYWORDS: PROFILE by CNB