Published: June 26, 2008 12:20 am            

CRESS: Goodbye, Mr. Marshall

I was a mischievous kid, prone to petty acts of vandalism and rebellion. So when I started high school, I was a little afraid of George Marshall.

The principal at Charlestown High School, I had little idea of who Marshall was, or what he had meant to people in Clark County. All I knew is that he was another in a long line of authority figures who would try (and usually fail) to keep me well-behaved.

As it turned out, all my interactions with him were pleasant. I discovered that he commanded a certain respect that I remember to this day, even though he departed his post after my freshman year. I remember how fair he was.

It’s odd, how time repeats.

I finally figured out who George Marshall is, and what he’s meant to this area. And, once again, he’s departing.

“There are a lot of great people around here,” Marshall said. “We’ll certainly miss being in the area. It’s been very good to my wife and I, and I only hope that we have been as good for it as it was for us.”

On July 1, the Marshalls will be finishing up their move to Phoenix, where they were fortunate enough to find a house just down the road from George’s brother. The move will be timed almost to the day of their arrival in the local area, which took place on July 3. That was 38 years ago.

It’s very odd how time repeats.

It was the year 1970 when George Marshall came aboard as the head boys’ basketball coach at Jeffersonville High School. His predecessors after the reign of legendary Red Devil coach Bill Johnson — Cliff Barker, Dale McNeeley and Dick Barr — did a solid job, combining for four sectional and two regional titles.

They did a solid job of keeping the seat warm for the man who ended up sitting there for the next 16 seasons — the longest run among the program’s 19 (two, from 1906-13 and from 1915-19, are not listed in the school’s official records) official bosses.

If Jeff’s basketball coaches — arguably among the most high-profile gigs in a sports-crazed city — were placed onto Mount Rushmore, George Marshall would be the Lincoln, his visage separated from his peers like a noticeable gap in-between. He didn’t father the program and he didn’t assist with its formative years.

But he led it as well as anyone ever has, and the numbers back it up.

Statistically speaking, Marshall is on a mountain all his own. His 274 wins easily outdistance his fellow Jeff mentors. Astoundingly, he lost only 94, good for a winning percentage of 74.5.

Only Mike Broughton’s astounding decade-long run that began in 1990 keeps Marshall from owning every Devil coaching record in the books. The two are linked by their success, their iconic status at one of the state’s proven hoops powers. It’s unclear who was more dominant, but they are also linked by their polar-opposite styles. Broughton coached three of Jeff’s top-five highest scoring teams; Marshall led eight of the school’s top nine defensive squads (the only break in Marshall’s streak was the 1999-00 team coached by Broughton).

That’s how time works. If Marshall was the later version of Johnson, or Janis “Hunk” Francis, then Broughton was the latter-day Marshall.

Not bad for a guy who didn’t even plan on staying around that long. After all, he’d already picked up nearly 100 wins in previous stops at Union Townshop and Southwestern (Shelbyville).

“The truth is, we thought it would only be for four or five years,” Marshall said. “It ended up being many more. We just have such fond memories. We were driving down (Clarksville’s) Lewis and Clark Parkway the other day, and I said, ‘well, this is our last week.’ It was a sad moment.”

But Jeff is where time paused while Marshall coached his way to immortality. All of it — three Final Four teams, the loss to eventual-state champ Connersville in double overtime in ‘72, the induction into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in 1996 — is forever frozen in the history books and on pictures that will forever adorn the halls of the school.

Predictably, Marshall says he relishes the chance to start again, the way he somehow rebuilt the lineup of his teams into a powerhouse nearly every season.

“We don’t mind moving,” he said. “It’s really an opportunity for us to be creative.”

His hoops career finally over, Marshall went on to preside over Charlestown High School for 11 years. He then added more names to his long list of friends — teachers, administrators, former students. People that he still stays in contact with to this day.

Where, during my first year of high school, I ran across him. He left an impression, even though I didn’t know who he was.

Now I know and now he’s gone. And you just wait for time to repeat. You wait for someone else like George Marshall to come and spend 38 years of his life earning glory on the court. Earning respect away from it.

It will happen, because time always does its thing. You just hope it won’t be somehow hollow because the man himself has packed up and, quite literally, ridden off into the sunset.

Good luck, Mr. Marshall.



Contact Matthew Cress at matthew.cress@newsandtribune.com

        

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