Grooms excelled in three sports at Brownsville
“One boy in particular was Henry “Ace” Grooms who I considered one of the greatest athletes to come out of Brownsville. He could play football, basketball and baseball. He became a boxer and won the heavyweight championship in the service. He was just a gifted athlete.”
Those were the words of former Brownsville Telegraph sports editor Bob Petriello, who ranked Grooms with the best that came out of the Brownsville area.
Grooms was an outstanding athlete excelling at football, basketball and track at Brownsville High School in the late 1950’s.
Grooms played end and later fullback on some competitive football teams at Brownsville. The Brownies posted a 3-6-1 record in 1948, a highlight for Grooms as a freshman was catching a 21-yard touchdown pass from George Dickinson with five seconds remain to lift the Brownies to a 13-12 win over Connellsville.
The Brownies posted a 5-5 mark in 1949 and finished 4-6 in 1950.
Grooms was Honorable Mention All-Fayette County and All-Big Five as a freshman, despite missing a good portion of the season due to injuries he was Honorable Mention All-Fayette County and Honorable Mention All-Big Five as a junior.
In his senior campaign at Brownsville he was All Fayette County, All-Big Five and Honorable Mention All-State.
Grooms played for Coach Andy Sepsi at Brownsville, and for Warner Fritsch, who took over in his senior season.
“I never had a bad experience with the coaches at Brownsville,” Grooms offered. “I was given every opportunity to achieve my goals and become a great athlete and I’m very honored to have had the opportunity to play for those guys because they were very talented coaches and very knowledgeable and all they did was enhance my career, so I had a great relationship with them and Coach Fritsch a particular relationship because made some statements ‘Ace Grooms’ was the greatest athlete in the United States. When you say athlete that means more than one sport, so I have great love for him having said that about me.”
Grooms was a force on the hardwood and was All-Section 7 for three years in hoops and captured the MVP award in the Fayette County Coaches Tournament two years in a row. The 6-foot-1, 195 pound Grooms was named second team All-State as a senior at Brownsville.
“I really enjoyed basketball, I was an all around athlete,” Grooms stated. “I enjoyed basketball, I enjoyed football and I was on the track team, so I had a nice experience and I had a nice rounded experience because I participated in all those sports. I ran in the 100 and 200 and I excelled in the shot put. I had good track relationship and a good deal with Coach Matt Wasko, who was also my Junior High basketball coach.”
At one time Grooms held the Fayette County record for the shot put with a heave of 47 feet 10 inches.
Grooms broke all scoring records in the basketball history of Brownsville High School when he ended his three-year career with a total of 1,134 points in 77 games. By scoring 455 points during the 1950-51 campaign, Groom cracked the previous one-year mark of 332 made by Charles Cunningham in 1948.
Grooms left Brownsville after the 1950-51 school year. He wound up at powerhouse Massillon High School in Ohio. Here is part of a column by Connellsville Courier sports editor Jimmy Wolfe explaining the situation in August, 1951.
“We often wondered how Massillon, Ohio, High School could repeatedly turns out scholastic grid powerhouses year after year — and, now we have some idea of how it’s done.
“Henry “Ace” Grooms, who completed his eligibility at Brownsville High and was one of the bright stars in the district during the 1950-51 school year, is “trying out” for the high school squad there according to reports.
“It is our understanding that the Grooms family moved to Massillon en masse, set up housekeeping and is firmly entrenched in the football heart of Ohio.
“In Pennsylvania, a scholastic athlete is permitted in competition only until his 19th birthday.
“Tack on another year for Ohio- and two Grooms boys because Henry’s younger brother is along for the ride.”
“My brother and I and our family did go to Massillon,” Grooms explained. “I did get an opportunity to involve myself in Massillon football and that is a legendary program. It is true that I moved their and played one season.”
What a season it was, Massillon went 9-1 and captured their fourth straight Ohio football championship. The journey for Grooms began with a bang.
Grooms earned a starting job with a big time performance against Stuebenville, the big fullback lugging the ball most of the distance in the winning touchdown march that ended with Grooms scoring with 10 seconds of the game left to play in Massillon’s 13-6 win. Grooms was unable to play but a minute of the South game because of a charley horse which was aggravated in the Steubenville game, but he finally got his first start against Alliance.
“I got to play for Chuck Mather at Massillon,” Grooms said. “Again I was blessed to be around some great football players. When I went to Massillon and after our training camp and our practicing, I was told by Coach Mather that I had all of the ability and skill in the world to become as great as I wanted to be.
“He was not going to start me because I had moved to Massillon and he didn’t want it misunderstood that there was some question about recruiting.
“He was going to let me play just a little bit in my first game. He let me get out there and the first time I ever touched the ball at Massillon I ran, I think, 80 yards for a touchdown and he pulled me out and brought me to the sidelines, and said I told you to just take it easy and I said I did. He said we will make headlines questioning your eligibility here and we did at the end of that week.”
Grooms garnered All-County honors and All-Ohio honors in football and basketball.
In basketball Grooms paced the Tigers to a surprise district championship and only his illness the night of the Akron North regional game kept the Orange and Black from a trip to the state finals at Columbus. Grooms scored 378 points in 24 games, narrowly missing the school record.
After graduating from Massillon, Grooms decided to attend the University of Illinois, but was drafted into the Army for two years.
Grooms’ athletic career continued to blossom in the military.
He captured the heavyweight championship of the Fourth Army and was 43-0-1.
“I started boxing in the Army outside of playing football in the Army,” Grooms said. “I had numerous offers to turn pro as a fighter, but I wanted to go back to football. I went to the University of Kansas because Chuck Mather was there as the head coach.
“I was doing great until I attempted to stop Homer Floyd, another ex-Massillon Tiger in a scrimmage. We had lost a defensive end and I played a few downs at defensive end. Floyd left Ace behind on the ground, totally paralyzed. I was making a tackle and I got hit in the head. I recovered completely and although I practiced in the spring.
“I was kept out of heavy body contact as a precaution. The injury largely responsible for his failure in classes I was unable to make up much of the work he had missed when hospitalized. I tried out for the CFL and then with the Chicago Bears, but the injury just wouldn’t allow me to take that risk, the doctors just would not allow it.”
Grooms became a policeman and then got into boxing first with a boxing club and then as a promoter. He started the famed KBA Boxing Club.
“I started the boxing club to help kids,” Grooms stated. “That was an out of this world success.”
Over the years Grooms has managed some top notch fighters like Floyd Mayweather Sr, Roger Mayweather, Len “Stinger” Hutchings, Vonzell Johnson, Dave Thach, Leon Spinks and Tony “TNT” Tucker. Grooms, 78, resides in Tampa, Fla. and remains involved in boxing as a promoter.
“I just want to thank former Brownsville newspaper man Bob Petriello,” Grooms explained. “I look at him as being the most influential person in my life.”
George Von Benko’s “Memory Lane” columns appear in the Tuesday editions of HeraldStandard.com. He also hosts a sports talk show on WMBS-AM radio from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturdays.