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Golf: Fred Meyer Challenge,
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August 8,2000
Volume 102, Issue 14
Emerald
Dellinger experiences stroke during vacation
■ The legendary Oregon track and field coach has a stroke
that leaves him in a New Jersey hospital
By Jeff Smith
Oregon Daily Emerald
Former Oregon track and field
coach Bill Dellinger proved this
past week that even idolized leg
ends aren’t immortal after he suf
fered a stroke early Thursday
morning.
Dellinger suffered the stroke in
his sleep and was found by his wife,
. Marol, in a near-immoblilized state
on the right side of his body. He was
in New Jersey on a brief vacation vis
iting friends before heading to the
Newport Running Camp in New
port, Rhode Island on Aug. 8-13.
The news of the 66-year-old’s
stroke has sent shock waves
through the Eugene community, es
pecially since Dellinger has contin
ued to be an active man since retir
ing as the Oregon men’s track and
field coach in the spring of 1998.
“It’s really startling,” Oregon ath
letic director Bill Moos said. “We’re
all thinking of him and wishing
him our very best. ”
Initially after his stroke,
Dellinger was in intensive care be
fore being transferred to a cardiac
monitoring floor on Friday after
noon. He was moved due to a po
tential blood clot or air bubble in
his bloodstream, but tests turned
out negative.
Dellinger is still located at Moun
tainside Hospital in Montclair, N.J.,
and is set to start therapy as early as
this week. Geoff Thurner, assistant
director of Oregon media services,
said that the only improvement
made over the weekend was the
slight movement of Dellinger’s
right leg and him sitting up slowly
in his hospital bed. Thurner said
that he still hasn’t received the re
sults from the tests to confirm what
exactly the cause of the stroke was.
“Bill is still a very young guy so
this came as a surprise to every
one,” Moos said. “We’re anxiously
hoping that he has a full recovery
and are optimistic that we can get
him back home.”
Dellinger took over as head coach
of the Ducks in 1973 from his former
coach Bill Bowerman. Four years lat
er, Tom Heinonen was hired on as
the women’s track and field head
coach and the two were a dynamic
coaching tandem up until
Dellinger’s retirement in ‘98.
Heinonen didn’t hear of
Dellinger’s fate until late Friday
night at a restaurant when he spot
ted a small story on the incident in a
newspaper.
“I was gone all week at running
camps and had no idea what had
happened to him,” he said. “It was
a shock to me and everyone else. ”
Heinonen mentioned how there
was a possibility of a running
group, consisting of post-collegiate
runners, who were to move to Eu
gene to train under Dellinger. “Bill
has got a lot left to give and I really
hope that he has a chance to do it,”
Heinonen said.
This is not the first time that
Dellinger has had to fight back from
health problems. In the summer of
1997, Dellinger learned that he had
prostate cancer, which was one of
the main factors in his decision to
retire that following spring.
Dellinger underwent a total of 25
radiation treatments in 1997-98.
Dellinger’s attitude then was to
simply deal with the cancer, defeat it
and then move on.
“As you get older and older,
there are more and more things that
can happen to you and most of
them are bad, so you just kind of ac
cept them and keep going with it,”
he told the Emerald in February of
‘98. “Ittakesalot of courage to grow
old because there are so many
things that can go wrong.
“I was going along my way think
ing I was invincible and I suddenly
found out that I’m not, so it kind of
woke me up.”
“The most shocking thing about
all of this is that it could happen to
anybody,” Heinonen said. “Bill
dodged a bullet with the prostate
cancer and hopefully he can do the
same thing here.”
Dellinger first broke onto the
Oregon track scene when he was
one of the storied program’s best
distance runners. In the years of
1953-56, he was a two-time NCAA
champion, three-time All-Ameri
can and three-time conference
champion.
As a 32-year cross country coach,
he led the Ducks to a total of 20 top
10 NCAA finishes, as well as
NCAA titles in 1971, 1973, 1974
and 1977. In his 26 years as the
track and field head coach, he guid
ed the Ducks to 14 top-10 NCAA
Outdoor Championships finishes,
including the NCAA title in 1984.
Emerald
Former Oregon coach Bill Dellinger was Steve Prefontaine’s coach in the early 1970s.
Overall, Dellinger’s athletes at Ore
gon totaled 146 All-American per
formances and 22 NCAA champi
onships. For Dellinger’s efforts, he
was elected into the U.S. Track
Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
“Bill Dellinger is a pillar of this
program and this community,”
Moos said. “His coaching legacy
and what he’s done at Hayward
Field is outstanding. He had a
tremendous career athletically and
coaching and has always appeared
to be very healthy. Our thoughts are
certainly with him and his family
this week.”
Postseason basketball tournament considered for Pac-10
■ Members of a Pac-10 advisory panel decide
whether to allow a postseason conference tourney
By Jeff Smith
Oregon Daily Emerald
The Pacific-10 Conference
.«nd the Ivy League are the
only Division I conferences
that don’t have a postseason
basketball conference tourna
ment during the weekend be
tween the regular season and
the NCAA Tournament. •
But if the Pac-10 presi
dents vote the way the Pac
10 athletic directors did this
past week, that could soon
very well change.
Last Wednesday, the con
ference’s
athletic di
rectors voted
by an 8-2
margin in fa
vor of such a
tournament
for both the men’s and
women’s programs.
The recommendation was
given to a panel made up of
university presidents, who
will vote on the proposal on
Oct. 3. If eight of the 10 presi
dents approve and the meas
ure gets through the Pac-10
council, the tournaments
would go into effect in
March of 2002.
“There’s still a ways to go,
but this was a positive en
dorsement that could lead to
it being a reality,” said Ore
gon athletic director Bill
Moos, who is chair of the
athletic director’s commit
tee. “I think the prospects are
very good that the plan we
have will go into effect. ”
There has long been con
cerns from some particular
Pac-10 coaches, such as Ari
zona head coach Lute Olson,
that a conference tourna
ment would cut into class
time. Moos, though, said
that “when we put the pen
cil to it” class time wouldn’t
be an issue because the Pac
10 schedule would move up
one week into December,
when students are still on
winter vacation.
“The main positive with
this is the exposure and the
excitement,” Moos said.
“The Pac-10 is always on the
Turn to Basketball, page 8
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