The death of a legend

Don Haskins died today.  For those of you who don’t recognize the name he was a College Basketball coach.  He coached men’s basketball at UTEP.  He was a national championship coach, a hall of fame coach and an El Paso icon.  He was a flawed man but he was much beloved by the people in El Paso. 

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?columnist=katz_andy&id=3574928

I love college sports and specifically college basketball.  I fell in love with the game while I was at University.  I have had season tickets to the UTEP Miners since the 80’s and spent many nights watching Coach work his magic.  Although he has been retired and there have been 4 other coaches at UTEP since he left there was always the spector of Coach at the games.  The arena is called the Don Haskins Center aka “The Don” or the “Bear’s Den”.   

Don Haskin was a legend, his story was told in the movie Glory Road, he broke the color barrier by starting 5 black players against an all white Kentucky team and won.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glory_Road_(film)

It just makes me sad that the legend is gone.