Saturday, June 21, 2008
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Gale Sayers says people don’t remember him anymore.
But judging by last night’s Party Recognizing Outstanding People in Sports at the Sprint Center, the former Kansas running back is dead wrong. Sayers won the Lamar Hunt Lifetime Achievement Award for excellence in amateur and professional sports.
“If you don’t know Gale Sayers and what he has done then you don’t know college or professional sports,” said Lew Perkins, Kansas athletics director.
Perkins took home the other major award, the Citation for Amateur Sports Excellence, from the Kansas City Sports Commission and Foundation’s annual awards banquet. He also accepted Brandon Rush’s Collegiate Male of the Year Award because the guard was in Minnesota working out in preparation for next week’s NBA Draft.
Just as Sayers became known for evading potential tacklers in his football days, he dodged questions about his award and preferred to discuss the past year of KU athletics.
“It was a very special year,” Sayers said. “The basketball team I knew was pretty good and the football team, I was very, very proud of them.”
Sayers traveled to Miami for the Orange Bowl to watch Kansas beat Virginia Tech. He opted to stay at home for the Final Four but said it was just as enjoyable.
Sayers compiled a couple of memorable years at Kansas of his own. He gained 3,917 total yards before graduating in 1964 and earned All-American honors twice. Sayers’ Jayhawk teams, however, never reached a bowl game.
He went on to play six years in the NFL for the Chicago Bears. There, he played in four Pro Bowls and set the NFL record for touchdowns in a rookie season with 22. Sayers became the youngest player ever inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1977 at 34 years old.
Sayers detailed his relationship with Bears coach George Halas and teammates Brian Piccolo and Dick Butkus in his acceptance speech.
Sayers entered and exited the stage on the east side of the Sprint Center to roaring applause and a standing ovation from the crowd. He also mingled with the audience and signed autographs before the ceremony began.
Sayers said it was nice to receive the award and he always enjoyed coming to Kansas City. He’s also looking forward to the start of next year for KU athletics when he thinks the University will continue to prove it has elite teams in not one, but two sports.
“If we can do it in basketball, why can’t we do it in football,” Sayers said.
Perkins said he was most excited about accepting his award because of the impressive list of past recipients. Ten-time national champion basketball coach John Wooden, track standout Jackie Joyner-Kearse and Tennessee women’s basketball coach Pat Summitt all have accepted the award before.
“It blows my mind to even think my name is going to be with those kinds of people,” Perkins said.
But it wasn’t all good news for Jayhawk fans at the ceremony. Missouri received the Border Showdown trophy for winning the overall sports series against Kansas this season.
Rush also had to share his award with Missouri running back Tony Temple. Rush and Temple have known each other since they were children and played on the same basketball team once.
“I offered to play Brandon one-on-one for this award, but I guess he didn’t make it,” Temple said. “He didn’t want this 5’9” of fury.”
- Edited by Deepa Sampat
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