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D-1 Montana player Database

Mslacat writes:
Correction: Brain Morris is a great triva quetion answer. He is the only basketball player that I am aware of the played varsity basketball for both the Bobcats and Griz. Brain signed with the Bobcats out of Sentinel in the late 70's played his freshman year at MSU and then transfered back to Missoula and played 3 years for the Griz.
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Actually "Brain Morris" is a different person. They called him "Brain" because he was smart enough to transfer from the Bobcats to the Grizzlies! :dance:

I can't leave a softball like that go unclobbered!
 
grizfnz said:
a few more that came to mind




Does anybody know if Shawn Fuller (6'9" or so, bozeman hawks mid to late 80's with Shane Collins) played D-1 ball? I'm pretty sure he went to a JC maybe Powell, WYO for a couple of years.

.
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Fuller played for Montana State for a while. Fuller had a lot of raw talent, but had a very hard time in the class room, and work habits, never really became a difference maker and faded away and quit.
 
pearl "poison" pollard is part of a huge "what might have been," because he came along about the same time as one of the greatest high school crops montana ever produced--ray howard, al dunham and zip rhoades, i.e. the "fabulous frosh." probably even better was russ sherrif who came in from helena a year later. all these kids had offers from out of state but all said they'd come to missoula provided the others did, so it was up to jiggs dahlberg to keep them together, and he manged to do it. dahlberg stayed in touch with pollard after he moved to utah and had hopes he might still sign him too, but by that time pollard had become one of the top recruits in the country (after wilt chamberlain) and he signed instead with jack gardner at utah.

this was a heady time for montana basketball, because we'd just opened the field house, which was acknowleded to be one of the best facilites in the west--certainly better than the smelly old einar nielsen gym in salt lake where utah played, and way ahead of most other schools too (though not byu.) had pollard signed with us, and had howard not blown out a knee, montana might have been a force in college basketball, because we were in a conference with utah, b.y.u., colorado state and new mexico where we'd have gotten a lot of national attention. we had another shot at major national attention a decade later when a cat named bucky waters of duke kept us from signing mike lewis out of sentinel, but alas, harry newburn had arrived to de-emphasize sports, so it would be another decade before we finally got the ball rolling under jud heathcote, and that brings us up to date, sorta.
 
Years ago, I was told that Elgin Baylor stopped in Missoula on his way from New Jersey To Seattle. He, as the story goes, met with coach Frosty Cox and was told that UM didn't need any players. Certainly an interesting story as you know the rest of the Elgin Baylor saga.
 
Mslacat said:
TrueGriz said:
Being a Sentinel Grad of '77, have to mention a couple of Sentinel players that went on to D-1:

Brian Morris, and Ben Demers each played 4 years for UM.
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Correction: Brain Morris is a great triva quetion answer. He is the only basketball player that I am aware of the played varsity basketball for both the Bobcats and Griz. Brain signed with the Bobcats out of Sentinel in the late 70's played his freshman year at MSU and then transfered back to Missoula and played 3 years for the Griz.
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Nope, a correction of a MslaCat post.

You are thinking of a different player from Sentinel. You are thinking of Kirk Rocheleau who signed with MSU, and then transfered to UM. I could have listed Kirk Rocheleau, but left him out for this very reason as he didn't letter at UM 4 years. I really do not think he played 4 years due to losing a year because of the transfer rule. Kirk is only a two year letterman at UM. I assume he only lettered once at MSU. Can a player play a year and not receive a letter for that year?

I also, could have listed Kevin Rocheleau, but not sure he played four years at UM. He only lettered twice at UM, same as Kirk.

Brian Morris is a 4 year lettermen for the Griz starting in 1979-80. He graduated from Sentinel in 1979.
 
citygriz said:
pearl "poison" pollard is part of a huge "what might have been," because he came along about the same time as one of the greatest high school crops montana ever produced--ray howard, al dunham and zip rhoades, i.e. the "fabulous frosh." probably even better was russ sherrif who came in from helena a year later. all these kids had offers from out of state but all said they'd come to missoula provided the others did, so it was up to jiggs dahlberg to keep them together, and he manged to do it. dahlberg stayed in touch with pollard after he moved to utah and had hopes he might still sign him too, but by that time pollard had become one of the top recruits in the country (after wilt chamberlain) and he signed instead with jack gardner at utah.

this was a heady time for montana basketball, because we'd just opened the field house, which was acknowleded to be one of the best facilites in the west--certainly better than the smelly old einar nielsen gym in salt lake where utah played, and way ahead of most other schools too (though not byu.) had pollard signed with us, and had howard not blown out a knee, montana might have been a force in college basketball, because we were in a conference with utah, b.y.u., colorado state and new mexico where we'd have gotten a lot of national attention. we had another shot at major national attention a decade later when a cat named bucky waters of duke kept us from signing mike lewis out of sentinel, but alas, harry newburn had arrived to de-emphasize sports, so it would be another decade before we finally got the ball rolling under jud heathcote, and that brings us up to date, sorta.
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Good post City,

I didn't know the history of those guys as well as you do. I guess you really are as old as some on here have said. :thumb:
 
Kirk actually has the single-game scoring record at MSU which he set as a true frosh under old Hank Anderson...after his transfer to UM that record was mysteriously absent from the Cat record book.... :-?
 
Spanky said:
Years ago, I was told that Elgin Baylor stopped in Missoula on his way from New Jersey To Seattle. He, as the story goes, met with coach Frosty Cox and was told that UM didn't need any players. Certainly an interesting story as you know the rest of the Elgin Baylor saga.
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spanky: it is true that a couple of outstanding grizzly athletes, ray lucien and john lands, did get off the train in missoula en route from baton rouge to the state of washington, and did have outstanding careers at montana. lucien became a hall-of-famer in basketball, while lands was an all-conference football player. i'm highly skeptical about elgin baylor, however. i'm sure that would be school lore by now if it were true.
 
Jim Pramenko went to MSU before playing for UM. I'm not sure how many years he lettered at UM....at least, two.
 
THE BETCH said:
That would be Pearl Pollard. Played as a 6' 8" freshman at Hamilton then the family moved to Utah.
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Pollards son Scott went to Kansas and now plays for the Indiana Pacers.
 
Grizbacker1 said:
THE BETCH said:
That would be Pearl Pollard. Played as a 6' 8" freshman at Hamilton then the family moved to Utah.
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Pollards son Scott went to Kansas and now plays for the Indiana Pacers.
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Scott is the youngest of 6 kids, Pearl died when Scott was 16. Older brother Alan played at BYU and the CBA, another brother at Central Washington in the early 90's, and I believe there was another who played at USC. All are 6'10" or better.
 
Here is a link to all the Griz lettermen, it also lists their hometowns on there so you can see which ones are in-state. Hopefully that helps, looks like their are a few griz on their that haven't been mentioned.

http://www.montanagrizzlies.com/media/basketball_men/06mediaguide/mbb_letterwinners.pdf
 
Just an update for those who care. I finished my data base form, and started the data entry. Yesterday after dinking and tweaking around a little this week end I took a major step towards data entry. I have just under 100 Montana High school players entered in with more to come. This database is being generated from the high school perspective, and is intended to possibly to be used for a Montana Prep High school web site. After working on this last night I really want to include a those fantastic Native American basketball athletes who never made it to D-1. I really think any data base that include the best of Montana Basketball players needs to includes the Elvis Old Bull, Takes Enemy, Yarlots, and Prettyweasles ect. so anyone who knows of a Native American basketball player who should be added please let me know.



Thanks again for all your continued help
 
There was another player who started for the Bobcats, then transferred to UM and started. Kirk Rocheleu (sp) was a Sentinel star who played his frosh year at MSU, scoring 40 points in a game versus the Griz.

Then, Kirk transferred to UM and started at guard for them. His dad was former UM coach.
 
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