Big week for Kentucky sports, and it’s all happening in Louisville.

Jockey Calvin Borel, three-time winner of the Kentucky Derby, will be among seven sports figures inducted into the Kentucky Athletic Hall of Fame Thursday night at the Crowne Plaza Hotel.

Two University of Louisville athletes, basketball star Pervis Ellison and football standout Dwayne Woodruff, will be inducted.

They will join auto racing executive Jerry Carroll, Sacred Heart Academy athlete, coach and administrator Donna Bender Moir, Centre College football star Bo McMillin, and tennis standout Julie Ditty of Russell High and Vanderbilt University.

A reception starts at 6 p.m. and will be followed by a banquet and induction ceremony.

The next night at Freedom Hall, the annual Kentucky-Indiana All-Star basketball games will be played, with the girls at 5:30 p.m. and the boys to follow.

The teams will play again Saturday night in Indianapolis with the girls game at 5.

Photo by MICHELLE HUTCHINS | UofL Athletics

By EARL COX
Sports Columnist
The Voice-Tribune 

Just when you think that there just can’t be anything else good that can happen to the University of Louisville, the Cardinals up and do it one more hallelujah time.

Will this year of a lifetime never end? Let’s hope not.

You know all of the delicious things that the Cards have allowed us to taste during the 2012-13 school year:

A Sugar Bowl championship victory for Charlie Strong’s Cardinals over Florida of the mighty Southeastern Conference.

A National championship in men’s NCAA basketball for Rick Pitino’s Cardinals.

A runnerup finish for the women in NCAA basketball. And Pitino’s son, Richard, was hired as the head coach at Minnesota. He succeeds former Kentucky coach Tubby Smith.

And don’t forget Julie Hermann, a Tom Jurich protégé, who was hired as the director of athletics of a Big Ten school, Rutgers. There are only two other women A.D.s in the whole wide collegiate world.

Surely UofL’s cup runneth over and there just can’t be anything left in the cookie jar.

No way, Jose.

Coach Dan McDonnell’s baseball Cardinals toppled favored and pitching-rich Vanderbilt on the favored Commodores’ home field in Nashville.

The Cardinals didn’t fool around before dispatching the Southeastern Conference champions in two games.

Omaha, here come the speedy Cardinals for the College World Series, armed with many strong arms and huge bats.

UofL coach McDonnell said, “Those who know me well know how much I respect Vanderbilt and coach Tim McDonald, the coaching staff and their players. This is three times in the last five years we’ve had to battle (in the post-season). It is hoped that the NCAA will split us up so one day maybe both of us can go to Omaha.”

Does anything out-rate the ball business, especially in our colleges?

I can think of a few, but not many.

Politics and sex would be at the top of my list. And the list is small.

Politics is No. 1, and I offer as proof the death of U.S Senator Frank R. Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat.

The powerful Democrat’s funeral silenced even the news of Julie Hermann’s ascension to the athletic directorship at Rutgers University, the state university of New Jersey.

That had to bring sighs of relief to her many friends in Louisville, which she left to run a  Big Ten Conference sports program.

Yes, the mighty Big Ten, the conference of Ohio State, Michigan and other biggies. The Big Ten is now even bigger and it has a woman – an impressive woman who  learned how to run an athletic program from the best in the business, Tom Jurich of the University of Louisville.

Now let me introduce you to Dr. E. Gordon Gee, president of Ohio State – excuse me, The Ohio State University. Don’t ever  leave off “The.”

I knew he was a strange bird when he left Ohio State for the presidency of Vanderbilt University and removed the athletic director and handed the athletic program to the Vandy faculty! But several years later, he returned to Ohio State, and Vandy now has an athletic director.

Gee is the president who once said when asked if he was going to fire Ohio State’s football coach, Jim Tressel: “I just hope the coach doesn’t dismiss me!”

As it turned out, Gee just recently fired himself.

And it didn’t help when he said the reason that Notre Dame wasn’t asked to become a Big Ten member was that “you just can’t trust those damned Catholics.”

And Gee added that academic programs at both the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville aren’t exactly on the Ivy League level.

He had to call the presidents of UofL, UK and Notre Dame and apologize.

Soon after, he announced his retirement and is headed to California.

Now which president will get to be the clown of his profession?

From the centuries old Male-Manual rivalry, to the Fern Creek-Fairdale competition, to the days when St. Xavier-Flaget ruled, to the Ballard-Eastern-Seneca,  Pleasure Ridge Park-Butler rivalry and now to the Trinity-St. Xavier competition it has been true. And that doesn’t even  count the girls’ rivalries: Sacred Heart-Assumption, Mercy-Presentation and on and on. And don’t forget that Flaget – alone among all of the public and Catholic schools – played mighty Central when that all-black school was winning national championships in both football and basketball under one of our all-time great coaches, Bill Kean.

Some of the rivalries exist only in our memories. And some don’t even exist. Remember Bunny Daugherty and Loretta? Her school was closed, but Sacred Heart was smart enough to make her its director of athletics and basketball coach. She was front and center in the fight for girls’ sports.

Throughout the many years I have been in Louisville, I have tried to keep high school rivalries front and center. So that makes what I have to pass on to you hurtful.

If you follow the outcomes of prep sports – particularly spring sports for both boys and girls – you are aware that The Courier-Journal tries its best to keep its readers up to date.

And some days the results are hurtful. For instance, if your child plays tennis or golf, his or her school may not have enough contestants to field complete teams – if any at all.

It really bugs me when I see that some schools have only one or two tennis players and/or golfers.

At least once this spring two teams went together to be able just to have two or three contestants in either golf or tennis.

We will never see it, but for the development of contestants in some sports, it would be great if two or three schools went together to field teams. Why won’t it happen? Because the Kentucky High School Athletic Association would never allow it.

And because it would open the door to recruiting.

What’s that? You say that recruiting goes on now? For heaven’s sake, who would believe that?

Surely most high school fans agree that something needs to be done about the absolute lock that Trinity has on the top class in football. Bob Beatty has built such a powerhouse that even St. Xavier can’t compete with Shamrock football. St. X has a new coach. It remains to be seen if Will Wolford, even with his NFL credentials, can  attract  enough top prospects to compete with Trinity.

If not, a new class should be added. Just accept the fact that Trinity is unbeatable and hand the Rocks another trophy. Then St. X, Male, Manual another school or two  could compete in a class of their own.

PRP Baseball Coach Bill Miller.

Coach of a Lifetime: Pleasure Ridge Park’s Bill Miller, who became Kentucky’s winningest baseball coach when his Panthers won his 1,007th  game. They quickly added still another victory by beating Fairdale in the district final.

Miller is 63 and insists that he WILL be back to coach next season. First though, there are a couple of things like another regional and state championship to be won.

Other coaches and athletes who earned acclaim this school year as chosen by The Voice-Tribune’s Earl Cox:

Trinity’s Bob Beatty, who directed the Shamrocks to another state football championship. And, to Ballard’s Chris Renner, who coached the Bruins to runners up in the Sweet 16 tournament.

Male Athletes of the Year: Trinity’s Mr. Everything James Quick, a champion in football and track once again. (And he was a regular on the Rocks’ state championship last school year). Defensive secondary coaches of University of Louisville’s football opponents must be driving themselves nuts trying to figure out ways to stop both Quick and DeVante Parker this fall. Can even Alabama have two receivers and a quarterback, Teddy Bridgewater, as talented?

Right up there with James Quick is another track standout, Jacob Thomson of Holy Cross. He not only captured both the 1,600 and 3,200, but shattered state records in both.

How good is Jacob? Good enough to set a state record held by Bobby Curtis, one of Kentucky’s all-time great distance runners.

Female Athlete of the Year: Sacred Heart Academy’s Katherine English, who won her third consecutive doubles tennis championship. She is a star in the classroom too, second in her class and winner of the Harvard Book Award. She also starred in field hockey.

Red Smith.

Yes, Red Smith’s beautiful prose is being brought back to us in a forthcoming book, “American Pastimes: The Very Best of Red Smith,” edited  by Daniel Okrent, to be published by the Library of America.

Sports Illustrated made two of Red’s columns available to its subscribers. They must be hyperventilating awaiting the availability of the book.

Yes, Red was that good. I was introduced to his work when I was in high school. Luckily, his columns were carried in the old Lexington Leader. The New York Herald-Tribune syndicated his columns to papers around our country.

Red was different. What he could do with the English language had to be read to be believed.

The first time I ever  met him was in the old, old press box at Churchill Downs in 1956 when he was struggling to get a heavy manual typewriter up a rickety stairway. Several people offered to help him, but he was having none of it. Finally he reached the top.

Red was something that Churchill Downs and the Kentucky Derby need now, a top journalist who loved – and knew – Thoroughbred racing.

Writer Headed Churchill!

America’s top sports columnists made it to Louisville, some of them lured by one of their own, New York columnist and TV star Bill Corum who, believe it or not, was named president of Churchill Downs!

It was Corum’s job to wine and dine top New York columnists the year around and get them to come to Louisville.

Once here the newspaper stars were entertained at what became known as The Courier-Journal party. C-J sports editor Earl Ruby got the paper’s owner, Barry Bingham Sr., to foot the bill on Thursday night of Derby Week. It became known as “The Courier-Journal party” long after the track took over sponsorship.

Walter “Red” Smith was the product of Green Bay, Wisconsin, and a graduate of Notre Dame.

The Western Sun

It was during a Notre Dame football game when Smith was asked by a young writer, “Mr. Smith, is that the West where the sun is setting?”

Red answered, “Son, if it isn’t you have one helluva story!”

Red was famous for saying, “There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at the typewriter and open a vein.”

After his paper shut down, Red took his beautiful writing to The New York Times and he won the Pulitzer prize.

He was the rare top writer who loved Thoroughbred racing (and thus the Kentucky Derby), baseball, boxing and fishing.

It took Red several years to warm up to Louisville’s greatest son, Muhammad Ali.

He was such a talented writer that Ernest Hemingway was a fan.

I will leave you with one of his special lines about a cold, cold Harvard-Yale football game: “Fans were wrapped thickly in the skins of dead animals.”

Anne Jewell of Hillerich & Bradsby has been elected to the Pee Wee Reese Chapter of SABR, a baseball organization. She and baseball historian Harry J. Rothgerber posed with a picture of the late Pee Wee Reese, a Louisvillian who is a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Thoroughbred racing has a rebirth about once a century:

The 19th century was favored by the start of the Kentucky Derby.

The 20th was highlighted by the Breeders’ Cup, the single most important leap forward by the racing community.

Kentuckians were responsible for highlights of the last two centuries. The 21st hopefully may be remembered  by the much needed addition of a powerful commissioner who can straighten out the ills that now plague the racing industry.

Who could do such a hard job?

A Kentuckian! One respected by everyone connected with the industry.

Who else but Seth Hancock of Claiborne Farm in Bourbon County. Yes, Mr. Secretariat!

Hancock is squeaky clean and knowledgeable of every facet of horse racing from breeding to racing and then to syndication. If anyone could end racing’s drug scourge, Seth could.

He could do for racing what Pete Rozelle did for pro football and what several  powerful commissioners have done for the National Basketball Association.

A commissioner respected by television leaders could broker deals that could expand just the three weeks of the Triple Crown chase with a highlight show most weekends.

A commissioner who could order the owner of a Triple Crown race to be available for a pre- and post-race TV show.

Are you aware who owns Oxbow? He won the Preakness and put an end to the dream of a Triple Crown winner. Do you even know what the owner looks like? Do you know that he owns the most famous of all the Thoroughbred farms? Yes, Calumet!

Do you know that he is a Kentuckian – probably the richest of all Kentuckians?

Because of John Asher, the Churchill Downs publicist who writes a racing column for The Voice-Tribune newspaper,  you may have remembered that he, and he alone, had mentioned that Brad Kelley now owns Calumet.

John Clay, columnist for The Lexington Herald-Leader, called Kelley “a reclusive billionaire” who sold his tobacco company that produced cigarettes to Bowling Green’s Houchens Industries for $1 billion. Kelley lives in neighboring Franklin, Tenn., but is listed as a Kentuckian.

Houchens is the major financial booster of Western Kentucky University football and basketball teams.

Race fans may have been confused when Oxbow did not run in Calumet’s devils-red silks but in the black and gold of Kelley’s Bluegrass Hall, just across Versailles road from Keeneland. Bluegrass Hall formerly was known as Bluegrass Farm when it was owned by Texan Nelson Bunker Hunt.

Kelley also owns other extensive Central Kentucky land.

Some questions I have received:

Is Meilinger the most versatile football player UK ever had?

Could be. He played quarterback, halfback or fullback and end.

Is he the best all-around Wildcat?

No.

Who is the most versatile athlete UK ever had?

That’s an easy one. Charles “Turkey” Hughes owns that honor. Turkey, who coached and was director of athletics at what is now Eastern Kentucky University, lettered in four varsity sports. On some days, he played baseball and ran track during the same couple of hours. That was when the Wildcats’ baseball field and Stoll (football and track) Field were side by side across from what is now Memorial Coliseum. Turkey finished with about 16 varsity Ks and four freshman monograms.

Turkey lettered all three years in football and basketball plus track and baseball. He played from 1923-25.

Who was the best all-around Cat? That’s easy. The Southeastern Conference says that Wallace “Wah Wah” Jones holds that title. He is an SEC Legend in three sports: basketball, football and baseball. He played on the Fabulous Five and won an Olympic Gold Medal. He feels the same way about that Gold Medal that teammate Ralph Beard did: “Podge, that Gold Medal was for our country!”

I may have had a part in Meilinger’s great story. When he was playing position after position during one football game, I said to my seat mate in old Stoll Field, “Meilinger plays every position except in the band.”

Guess what: The next home game there was No. 80 (Meilinger’s number) lined up carrying a huge tuba in the marching band!

It wasn’t Meilinger, of course, but a UK friend of mine from Lafayette High in Lexington, Jack Hall, who was about as big as Steve.

Meilinger, who retired from the U.S. Marshall’s service, will be inducted Dec. 10 in New York City. The Football Hall of Fame is now at Notre Dame, but a new Hall of Fame building is being built in Atlanta.

Another triple sport UK athlete was Ellis Johnson, another great athlete from Ashland. He later coached both football and basketball at Morehead.

He also is famous for something he pulled on while coaching a basketball game in Tennessee during the early days of the Ohio Valley Conference.

Morehead was getting slaughtered and was down to four players. Ellis played in his sock feet so the game could continue!

The next time you see Tony Neely, UK’s sports information director for football, give him a pat on the back. He dug up information from long ago to get Meilinger honored.

Joel Rosario riding captured the 139th Running of The Kentucky Derby. Photo by AMBER CHALFIN | Contributing Photographer.

Is there a much-needed Triple Crown in Orb? For the sake of Thoroughbred racing, let us hope so.

Nothing could focus the sporting world on racing more than Orb following up on his ground-gobbling, pulsating come-from-behind stretch run in the Kentucky Derby and winning the Preakness and Belmont.

Not since 1978 when Affirmed became the 11th champion to win all three of the classic races has the sport been ruled by a Triple Crown champion.

It’s time.

Just to make sure that it all wasn’t a dream, Shug McGaughey, the gentlemanly trainer from Lexington, arrived at Orb’s Churchill Downs stall about 4 a.m. the morning after winning his first Derby.

Orb looked fresh and ready for another stretch run and didn’t want to return to his stall after a walk. McGaughey said his plan for Orb is to have a light workout next week at Belmont and then be vanned to Pimlico for the May 18 Preakness. McGaughey’s headquarters  is at Belmont.

Princess of Sylmar and Mike Smith were returned to the Winner’s Circle after winning the Kentucky Oaks. Photo by AMBER CHALFIN | Contributing Photographer.

In addition to Orb, other Preakness contenders are expected to be Mylute (fifth in the Derby), Oxbow sixth, Will Take Charge eighth, Itsmyluckyday 15th and Goldencents 16th, plus Illinois Derby winner Departing, Sunland Derby winner Governor Charlie, Fear The Kitten and Bellarmine.

The Derby Finish

1. Orb $12.80, $7.40, $5.40
2. Golden Soul $38.60, $19.40
3. Revolutionary $5.40

Others: 4. Normandy Invasion, 5. Mylute, 6. Oxow, 7. Lines of Battle, 8. Will Take Charge, 9. Charming Kitten, 10. Giant Finish, 11. Overanalyze, 12. Palace Malice, 13. Java’s War, 14. Verrazano, 15. Itsmyluckyday, 16. Frac Daddy, 17. Goldencents, 18. Vyjack, 19. Falling Sky.

The Oaks Finish

1. Princess of Sylmar $79.60, $29.40, $14.00
2. Beholder $9.00, $5.60
3. Unlimited Budget $3.80

Others: 4. Dreaming of Julia, 5. Midnight Lady, 6. Pure Fun, 7. Close Hatches,  8. Rose to Gold, 9. Seaneen Girl, 10. Silsita.

You would be surprised at how many University of Louisville basketball fans there are who would appreciate it if a little love would be spread around for two other national championship teams coached  by Peck Hickman.

In 1948 the Cardinals won the National Association of Intercollegiate Basketball title. The top players on that team were Jack Coleman of Burgin and Kenny Reeves of Maysville. Other Cardinals were Bob Borah, John Knopf, Ray “Button” Combs, Glenn “Ish” Combs, Paul Walker, Deward Compton, Oz Johnson and Lum Edwards.

Coleman was a long-time star in the NBA.

An even  better Cardinal team was the 1956 group that won the National Invitational Tournament (NIT)  when it was about the equal of the NCAA. The stars of that team were All-American center Charlie Tyra and guards Phil Rollins and Jim Morgan.

Other Cardinals were Dick Keffer, Gerry Moreman, Roscoe Shackleford, Bobby Potter, Jim Heins, Al Glaza, Jerry DuPont, Jim Herren, John Froning, Paul Basham, John Varoscak, Bill Darragh, Harold Pike and Herb Harrah.