Hopkins is known as a breeding ground for successful professionals. Whether these professionals are doctors, academics, researchers, engineers or lacrosse players, Hopkins has gained a reputation for placing highly skilled people into high-ranking workforce positions. But is Hopkins also a breeding ground for legendary basketball coaches?
Initial research breeds one positive result. Can you guess who it is? I'll give you three clues.
He coached his team to an upset victory in the 1983 NCAA Division I men's basketball championship game. At the 1993 ESPY Awards he gave one of the most noteworthy and memorable speeches by any sports figure. He has a cancer research foundation established in his memory, which to date has raised over $70 million.
The man is James "Jim" Valvano - affectionately referred to by sports junkies as Jimmy V. Valvano. He was the head basketball coach at North Carolina State University during the 1980s, winning a national championship and amassing 209 wins. He had several head coaching stops, including Bucknell, Iona and Hopkins.
Before I go on talking about how neat it is that this legendary basketball coach got his start at Hopkins, I want to bring attention to the fact that the first annual Jimmy V Week recently took place from Nov. 28 to Dec. 4. Jimmy V Week was a "week-long initiative featuring special content across ESPN platforms and programs to drive awareness of and donations to The V [cancer] Foundation." The week was kicked off with an airing of Jimmy V.'s legendary 1993 speech at the first ESPY Awards. Before you proceed to read the rest of this column, I strongly encourage you to watch the speech in its entirety on YouTube. It will take 10 minutes, and I guarantee you it will be ten of the most reflective and emotionally gripping minutes of your week.
For those of you deterred by the speech's length, try to remember the last time someone accepting an award made a speech that lasted longer than "I want to thank God, my family and my agent." This should immediately tell you how significant this speech is. Valvano, who was dying from terminal bone cancer, knew that "time was very precious." His speech was special; not because it was a sympathetic or a somber tearjerker, but because of how he beamed about how happy he was to still be alive and how fortunate he was that he could still cherish those around him.
It was not so much what he said in the speech, but the tone with which the speech was presented. An often energetic and emphatic coach (possibly the second most famous Jim Valvano clip is one of him running around on the court after his championship victory looking for someone to hug), this speech resonates with energy. He talks with jocularity and a smile on his face about his early coaching career, the life lessons he has learned and how everyone on this planet should spend time each day loving and reflecting. This was a man who would die less than two months later, but who still could say with a grin on his face, six minutes into the speech, "that screen is flashing up there '30 seconds' like I care about that screen up there. I got tumors all over my body and I'm worried about some guy in the back going '30 seconds!'" following it up with an Italian hand gesture.
Valvano must have known that these were going to be his last moments in the national spotlight. With this in mind, he used this speech as an opportunity, in an admirably and touchingly selfless manner, to announce the founding, with help from ESPN, of the Jimmy V Foundation for Cancer Research, so that "someone else might survive, and might prosper, and might actually be cured of this dreaded disease."
He finished the speech with words strong enough to send chills down the emotional spine of the strongest human.
"Cancer can take away all of my physical abilities. It cannot touch my mind, it cannot touch my heart and it cannot touch my soul. And those three things are going to carry on forever."
It seems hard for those who have lost someone they cherish to cancer to understand how he can remain positive in the face of such an adversity. As Jimmy V puts it in his speech "Nothing has changed for me! I'm a very emotional, passionate man." But that is exactly why this speech is one of the greatest of all time. If this man, who was dying at cancer at the age of 47, with three young daughters, could remain positive, it should serve as motivation to all of those fighting cancer, and all of those who know someone battling the disease.
Valvano coached at Hopkins for only one season, during the 1969-1970 school year. As a novice 22-year-old in his first collegiate varsity coaching job, he led the team to a 10-9 finish. This may not seem particularly notable, but it was, in fact, Hopkins's first winning season in 24 years. The next season he became an assistant coach at the University of Connecticut. While people associate Jim Valvano with many different things, basketball coach at Hopkins is certainly far down on the list. But in Valvano's lone year here, it was pretty evident to those who knew him that he was special.
Former Hopkins lacrosse coach and athletic director Bob Scott spoke very fondly of him. "Jim Valvano was something special. We were fortunate to have him. He was just a great personality. We all thought that he would end up with the New York Knicks - he had the brains, the pizazz and the sense of humor."
Scott could also attest to Valvano's skilled oratorical abilities. "He could absolutely spellbind you with stories. He could be telling stories and you would end up holding your sides with how he presented the messages he was trying to get across. In his speeches, he would refer to his time at Hopkins as noting that his main responsibility was being in charge of 'selling tickets during the lacrosse games.'"
I feel it is fitting that nearly 40 years after his head coaching stint here, synergy between basketball and medical research has come full circle at Hopkins. Several Hopkins researchers have been named V Foundation Scholars, and as such have been awarded grants for breakthroughs in cancer research.
Even though Jimmy V was only at Hopkins for one year, I am honored that such an inspiring man was a member of the Blue Jay community.
As someone who has recently lost a relative to cancer, I know how tough the loss can be. But Valvano's courage, high spirits and selflessness can be an inspiration everyone - I know they are to me. And that is why his legacy will live on for ages to come.
To learn more about the V Foundation, check out http://www.jimmyv.org.
