Cougars set to add to Hall of Fame

Nine former coaches and athletes will be inducted into the Washington State University Athletic Hall of Fame on Sept. 8.

Director of athletics Jim Sterk announced that induction ceremonies will take place the night prior to WSU’s home football game with Idaho. The Class of 2006 will bring to 113 the number of players and coaches inducted since the first group was selected in 1978.

This year’s inductees include four from the Pioneer group, gymnastics coach Hubert Dunn (1947-62), and athletes Vaughn Hitchcock (football-wrestling, 1952-55), Dick Hannula (swimming, 1948-50) and Janet Harman (bowling-field hockey, 1949-52).

Contemporary inductees include former athletic director Sam Jankovich (1972-84), and athletes Dan Lynch (football, 1980-84), Laura Lavine (track, 1987-88), Steve Puidokas (basketball, 1974-77) and James Donaldson (basketball, 1977-79).

Donaldson, a 7-foot-2, 275-pound center, holds the WSU record for blocked shots in a game (eight) and career (176). The seventh pick of the fourth round by Seattle in 1981, he played for six teams in an NBA career through 1995.

Dunn’s WSU association ran from 1947-62, first as a four-year varsity letter winner, then as not only the school’s first gymnastics coach, but the first in the old Pacific Coast Conference. He’s considered by many the father of Northwest gymnastics.

Hannula was a WSU co-captain his senior year who went on to become a successful high school coach in Tacoma, first at Lincoln, then at Wilson, where he started a swimming program at the new school and won 323 consecutive meets, including 24 straight state titles.

Harman, who is deceased, starred for the Cougars in field hockey, but became better known in bowling. She was a member of the first WSU Bowling Club who went on to a successful, hall of fame career in the Professional Women’s Bowling Association.

Hitchcock earned three varsity letters in both wrestling and football and went on to a hall-of-fame career as a wrestling coach at Cal Poly and was coach of the 1976 U.S. Olympic wrestling team in Montreal.

Jankovich, who is retired and lives in Hayden Lake, came to WSU in 1968 as defensive coordinator on Jim Sweeney’s football staff, moved into administration in 1971 and became athletic director in 1976. It was under him that WSU undertook the expansion of what is now Martin Stadium, and inaugurated the Hall of Fame into which he enters.

Lavine, a two-time Pac-10 and NCAA outdoor All-American champion in the discus (1987 and ‘88) and shot putter who ranks seventh on WSU’s all-time list in the event, was selected in 1996 as WSU’s Woman Athlete of the Decade.

Lynch, from Lewis and Clark High School who resides in Prague, Czech Republic, was a two-time team captain and an All-American offensive guard in 1984. He is the only player to participate in two Senior Bowls. He played the event in 1983 following his fourth year at WSU, but was then granted a medical hardship, played another season for the Cougars, and was selected for the Senior Bowl again in ‘84. He also won the prestigious NCAA postgraduate award in 1985.

Puidokas, who is deceased, rewrote the WSU record book during his career, establishing career marks for points (1,894), field goals (734), field-goal attempts (1,499), rebounds (992), minutes played (3,592) and points in a single game (42). He ranks second in points and minutes played.

He is the only WSU basketball player to have his uniform number (55) retired and played professionally in Europe for many years.