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FROM THE PUBLISHER

2020 losses continue mounting

Posted

My favorite interview of 2020 was a conversation with New Mexico State University Aggie basketball legend Jimmy Collins. Aggie Nation was saddened to learn Collins passed away Dec. 12.

When Aggie coach Lou Henson passed away in July, I really wanted to talk to Collins. We’re in the 50th anniversary year of the Aggies’ 1970 Final Four team. Henson was coach, and Collins was the star player.

“I’ll always make time to talk about Coach,” Collins said when I reached him. “We all have guardian angels, whether we recognize them or not. I was lucky enough to recognize my guardian angel, and it was Coach Henson.”

The sadness in Collins’ voice was eclipsed by the obvious joy he had when thinking about Henson, the role he played in his life and that Final Four team. Collins sounded so vibrant, I would never have guessed he himself would be gone less than five months later. But the two were only separated by 14 years. It’s a reminder of the youth of everyone involved with that long-ago Final Four team.

Truly a complete player, Collins averaged 24.3 points a game his senior year, along with 4.6 rebounds and 2.9 assists. He could score from anywhere on the floor, and he did so that senior year at a 51-percent clip. Had he played in the three-point era, he probably would have averaged close to 30.

In the semifinals of that Final Four, the Aggies’ opponent was UCLA, which had won five of the previous six NCAA championships. The Bruins’ coach, John Wooden, is generally considered the greatest college coach in history. In the ultimate compliment to Collins, Wooden told his team: “Don’t worry about Collins. He’s going to get his points and we can’t stop him. But if we contain their other players, we will win.”

Indeed, Collins lit up the scoreboard, leading everyone on the floor with 28 points. But the rest of the Aggies combined for only 49 points, and the Bruins won going away, 93-77.

With the support of Henson, Collins got into coaching, and was the head coach at University of Illinois-Chicago for many years. RIP, Jimmy.

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The Las Cruces Bulletin family also had a difficult weekend.

Our circulation manager, Teresa Tolonen, lost “the best aunt, godmother (Nina), mother figure a girl could ever ask for.” We are sending thoughts and prayers to Teresa and her family.

The Bulletin owners, the Osteen family, lost their father, Hubert Osteen Jr., Dec. 12. The Osteen family has owned the newspaper in Sumter, S.C., since 1894, and no, that’s not a typo. It’s 126 years. Hubert led the operations for decades.

I had the pleasure of meeting Hubert once, and found him to be passionate about journalism and community. He was the dean of South Carolina newspapermen, and the state’s press association executive director, Bill Rodgers, described him as “an icon in South Carolina journalism.”

Our hearts go out to his widow, Jackie, and the entire Osteen family.

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The isolation and emotional stress of the pandemic has added extra weight to the many losses of 2020.

Richard Coltharp

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