Enshrined
Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame inducts Class of 2025
The annual Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame induction ceremony is as popular as ever with the Class of 2025 being enshrined Friday at Pleasant Valley Golf Club.
Headlining the new group were Brownsville graduate and former major leaguer Doug Dascenzo and Fayette County’s all-time leading scorer in basketball, Connellsville graduate James Hairston.
Also inducted were Uniontown graduates Marc Vassar and Pete Smith, Laurel Highlands graduates Candace John, Mike Revak and Stephanie Smith, Albert Gallatin graduate Katie Kelly and Geibel Catholic graduate Tara Cochrane Warrington, with, in the deceased category, Brownsville graduate Buck Grover and Uniontown graduate Roger Miller, along with two teams: Penn State Fayette men’s basketball of 1983 (represented by coach Rick Hauger) and Uniontown boys basketball of 2002 (represented by Red Raiders career scoring leader Terrance Vaughns).
Grover was represented by Bob Fee and Miller was represented by his son Jeremy Miller.
The luncheon was preceded by the Hall of Fame golf outing.
“It was an outstanding event,” Hall of Fame co-founder George Von Benko said. “I think we had over 100 golfers plus 178 that came to the luncheon as well so we were at capacity.
“It was a great afternoon. I really enjoyed the crossover. We had many past Hall of Famers in the crowd and three current athletes there, that being the Vielma brothers (Connellsville WPIAL wrestling champions Kai and Lonzy) and (Geibel Catholic girls basketball star) Emma Larkin, who got to rub elbows with everybody and they seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves.”
The course was wet but the popular golf event went on.
“Golf was a little bit slow with all the rain we had and they had to stay on the cart path,” Von Benko said. “That threw us a little bit behind, but, otherwise, it went smoothly and went well I thought.
“It was just another one of those afternoons of camaraderie with the generations of Fayette County athletes getting together to honor the new class and breaking bread. This is a very special event and it’s sort of taken on a life of its own.”
Von Benko would like to see the Hall of Fame continue to grow.
“The only thing I would ask people, as I did at the event, is we still need more memberships,” said Von Benko, who, himself, was inducted into the Hall of Fame last year. “There are a lot of people out there who used to be members who aren’t any more and we could use some of those coming back into the fold. You can go online and get a lifetime membership or for $20 a yearly membership. A yearly membership allows you to nominate and vote for our Hall of Fame and also have a vote in the Pennsylvania Hall of Fame.
“One of things about our membership total is it determines the amount of votes that we get for the state Hall of Fame. For every 100 members we get four votes. We’re a little over 400 right now and I would like to get up to 500.
“We want to put more and more athletes into the Pennsylvania Hall of Fame because we have some very deserving people. We didn’t get anyone in this year and I was a little disappointed about that.”
Even so, the Hall of Fame golf outing and luncheon remain highly anticipated events.
“The level of interest in it has been there year after year,” Von Benko said, “and I don’t see that changing any time soon.”