Oglethorpe's Sports
Hall of Fame
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History of Athletics at Oglethorpe 
Varsity athletics at Oglethorpe University started with basketball
in 1916. During the next three years, baseball and football teams
were organized by Coach Frank Anderson.
His contemporaries called Coach Anderson the Dean of Southern
Baseball Coaches. The Stormy Petrels were defeating the University
of Georgia, Georgia Tech, University of Alabama, University of South
Carolina, Dartmouth, Furman and many other major universities, while
winning the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association
championship in 1924 and in 1925.
Anderson developed some great players such as : Luke Appling, L. N.
Turk, Clay Parrish, Greek George, Lefty Willis to name a few that
reached major league baseball teams.
Oglethorpe's President, Dr. Thornwell Jacobs, determined to go big
time, added Coach Harry Robinson, an All-American from Syracuse, New
York as his football coach in 1925. He felt he could get national
attention for Oglethorpe University.
Robinson proved his genius in football. He developed a slick
military shift and a most deceptive double wing offense on the
football field. Immediate success came his way with the Petrels
winning the SIAA championship in 1924 and in 1925. Some fine
athletes like Nutty Campbell, John Knox, Adrian Maurer, Parker
Bryant, Wendell Crowe, Curley Fulton, Ike Cousins, Cy Bell and
others led the Petrels in victories over Clemson, Georgia, Georgia
Tech, Wake Forest and Florida, while losing close games to Syracuse
and Alabama.
John Patrick succeeded his former football coach in 1933. Coach Pat
was a tireless worker but was confronted with a depression budget.
His teams, though not as successful as earlier teams, were typical
Stormy Petrels. They were tough, conditioned, disciplined and
well-coached. Their schedule was still tough with Kentucky, Miami,
Georgia, Auburn, The Citadel and Chattanooga included in the
opposition.
Some of Coach Pat's outstanding players were: Little All-American
Jack Puryear, Frank Metrick, Kimsey Stewart, Ernie Sheffield, Bot
Owens, Fred Kelley and Cecil Moon. World War II curtailed all sports
in 1942.
During the early 1930's, Coach Don Overton developed a good
basketball team. He took a team including Ed Copeland, Jimmy
Sullivan, Cecil Moon, Ben Forkner and Buster Fisher on a trip to
play Penn State, George Washington, Long Island University and
several other eastern powerhouse teams.
In 1947, Coach Swede Phillips arrived at Oglethorpe. He mixed some
war veterans with young players and developed an outstanding
basketball program, reaching the national playoffs in Kansas City in
1948.
The next outstanding coach arrived in the person of Garland
Pinholster in 1956. With no budget and very few athletes, Pinholster
gathered a few old athletes and friends of Oglethorpe and the first
Booster Club was organized. In four short years, with the help of
the Boosters and a small budget, the Petrels were again playing
basketball in national tournaments in Kansas City and Evansville
with players like Bobby Nance, Morris Mitchell, Ray Thomas, Tom
Norwood, Bill Carter, Wayne Dobbs and John Guthrie to name a few.
Coach Pinholster, with his great wheel offense and a super
hard-nosed defense, defeated powers like Rhode Island, Southern
Illinois, St. Peters, Tennessee State, Jacksonville, Georgia
Southern, New Hampshire and many others to compile a record of 184
against only 62 losses. He developed many outstanding players and
also authored four best sellers.
Coach Bill Carter and Coach Tom Norwood followed their coach with
success and reached regional playoffs in Norfolk, VA. And
Louisville, KY.
During the early 1970's as a member of the NAIA, the program fell on
hard times. There was even talk of dropping athletics at Oglethorpe.
Instead, Dr. Manning Pattillo arrived as President in 1974 with the
aim of developing a non-scholarship program similar to the Ivy
Leagues. He hired Coach Jack Berkshire as Director of Athletics and
men's basketball coach, with the goal of developing a broad-based
program to compete against small liberal arts colleges with strong
academics. His basketball program, confronted with high academic
entrance requirements and no basketball scholarships, progressed so
well that by 1979, he had a 23-7 season. (Bob Wolfe, Tom Seitz,
Dennis Bailey, Larry Broadnax and Richard Johnson led this group),
and by 1984 he had won 100 games reaching the national playoffs
several years.
Coach Berkshire's 1982-83 team sported three Academic All-Americans
in basketball - Jay VanderHorst, John Marshall and Steve Oliphant ,
the first time three players on the same team were so honored.
In 1988, Oglethorpe's athletic program opened a new chapter in its
history by joining the NCAA at the Division III level. The program
expanded to meet Division III requirements and to enhance its
chances to be accepted into a quality Division III conference.
Adding five sports in one year, Oglethorpe soon attracted the
attention of the College Athletic Conference, a conference of top
small private liberal arts colleges in the South. Oglethorpe was
invited to join the conference provided they also add baseball and
women's basketball. In 1991, Oglethorpe became a member of the newly
named Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference.
Under Berkshire's leadership, the program increased from six sports
to the current 14 sports sponsored. Gender equity was achieved
during this growth with seven women's sports currently offered.
The men's basketball team captured the University's first SCAC
championship in 1994. This team earned a spot in the NCAA national
playoffs, as did the 1995 team which finished second in the
conference race. Berkshire's 22-year career as basketball coach saw
him reach 315 wins in the 1997-98 season.
Oglethorpe's baseball teams consistently qualify for the conference
playoffs (top four teams in conference).
The men's golf team moved to the top of the conference in 1998
winning SCAC championships and national rankings in 1998, 2000 and
2001. Women's golf is the newest sport having been added in 1997-98.
Men's and women's cross country and track, women's volleyball, men's
and women's tennis and men's and women's soccer all compete in the
SCAC. The conference currently includes: Center College (KY);
Millsaps College (MS); Hendrix College (AR); DePauw University (IN);
Rose-Hulman Institute (IN); Rhodes College (TN); University of the
South (TN); Trinity University (TX) and Southwestern University
(TX).
The University's most outstanding contributors to its athletic
history have been inducted into the Athletic Hall of Fame. Over one
hundred individuals have been elected and plaques honoring these
individuals are displayed in Dorough Field House.
From its beginning in 1916 to the current edition, the athletic
teams of Oglethorpe have had to compete against teams with greater
talent, stronger manpower, larger coaching staffs and larger student
bodies, but like their mascot, "The Petrel" (pronounced Peatrel),
which can fly at sea against the fiercest storms and strongest
winds, the Stormy Petrels fight hard to overcome these obstacles.
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