Grambling officially petitions to name Assembly Center for Fred Hobdy

Grambling’s Fred Hobdy won more college basketball games than any coach in Louisiana history, and was an integral part in the school’s only two undefeated seasons in football.

By Friday, the long-overdue honor of naming GSU’s new multi-purpose basketball facility after Hobdy will be complete. Grambling this week is officially petitioning its oversight committee, the University of Louisiana System Board, for permission to make the change. The matter will be considered in committee today, and will be discussed in front of the full board tomorrow.

FRIDAY AFTERNOON UPDATE: Grambling’s Hobdy resolution has been approved by the University of Louisiana System Board. “It’s a great day, a beautiful day in Grambling,” said James McJamerson, a GSU professor and Hobdy family member.

We first brought up the idea in 2005, as the Assembly Center began to rise behind Robinson Stadium on campus. Nearly five years, and a new school president later, widow Mary Hobdy can rejoice in an honor Fred Hobdy (pictured above, right) should have been given from the start.

Frank Pogue, interim replacement at Grambling for the departed president Horace Judson, deserves credit for seeing that. Not long after rescinding Judson’s hotly debated campus parking plan, he dismantled Judson’s even more controversial idea for christening the assembly center.

Pogue got both of them right.

READ THE LETTER: On Jan. 29, TheDerisoReport published Pogue’s request to the University of Louisiana System board. Read it here.

Nobody is going to buy the naming rights for a multi-use physical education building tucked into the back of Grambling State University. And even if they were, adminstrators should understand the school’s legacy enough to sell them something else.

Hobdy posted 572 basketball wins over 30 seasons from 1956-86. His 1961 squad, featuring future Basketball Hall of Famer Willis Reed, won the National Athletic Intercollegiate Association championship — still the first, last and only national men’s title ever won in this state.

“I think naming the arena for Coach Hobdy is a great idea,” said Reed, who later claimed two NBA crowns with the Knicks. “Coach Hobdy spent his whole life there. He loved Grambling. He was a black-and-gold guy.”

The assembly center, opened in 2007, was produced by the Shreveport-based Newman Marchive Partnership. It houses the Grambling women and men’s basketball programs, as well as health, physical education and recreation departments. The facility also serves as a multi-purpose space for the university and surrounding community.

The first event ever held there was the funeral for Grambling legend Eddie Robinson, a personal friend who coached Hobdy on the gridiron, hired him as an assistant football coach and handed him the reigns to the basketball program.

Earlier this month, a dedication banquet for the Eddie G. Robinson Museum was held at the assembly center — and Robinson protege Doug Williams made a powerful argument for renaming it after Hobdy.

The long-delayed plan for a new basketball facility began during the tenure of GSU’s second president, Ralph Waldo Emerson “Prez” Jones, in the 1970s. But the idea didn’t pick up steam until 1994, when legislation was finally passed to issue $1 million in bonds.

Another decade passed before $17 million in top-priority bonds was approved in 2004 to fund construction, with another $6.75 million set aside for use when needed.

Hobdy never saw the ground-breaking ceremonies. He died on Dec. 8, 1998.

“If there is anybody that I know of who it should be named after, it was him,” said longtime Rayville basketball coach Larry Wilson, who played in high school for Herschel West — one of Hobdy’s best guards — and then for Hobdy at GSU.

Nicknamed “Lefty,” Hobdy coached 26 All-Americans and his teams won seven SWAC championships. Along with the 1961 NAIA title, Hobdy’s teams also earned two Midwest Conference championships, two NCAA regional championships and four NAIA district titles. Half of his 30 squads won 20 or more games, and two won 30 or more.

“It would be an injustice and a disservice to name the arena after anyone other than Fred Hobdy,” said Larry Wright, the SWAC’s 1975-76 Player of the Year under Hobdy before helping Washington to an NBA championship.

Basketball, however, wasn’t the total measure of Hobdy’s legacy at GSU.

Hobdy was a member of Eddie Robinson’s legendary 1942 squad before leaving school to fight in World War II. That year, the Tigers not only finished undefeated, but were unscored against. Later, in 1955, he coached ends for Robinson on Grambling’s second undefeated football team.

The Winnfield native played baseball for Jones, and was also an assistant on the diamond. He served as athletics director at GSU from August 1989 through September 1996, as well.

“Coach Hobdy did so many significant things — and he did it while playing at Grambling and then coaching at Grambling,” Reed said. “Naming the building after him would be a great tribute to a man who gave so much to the school.”
–
Follow us on the Web –
TheDerisoReport on Facebook
TheDerisoReport on Twitter
TheDerisoReport on YouTube