Goodbye to Mike Gale at the age of 70.
Gale played for five teams in the ABA and NBA after being signed by the Kentucky Colonels in 1971.
Gale made two All-ABA defensive teams as a point guard but missed playing for two ABA champions by a year as he was traded from Kentucky to New York before the Colonels title and New York to San Antonio before the Nets won the league's final championship in 1976.
Gale spent most of his career with the Spurs and was a very popular player in San Antonio as part of the Spurs two division-winning title teams in the first three years following the ABA-NBA merger.
Goodbye to Lou Henson at the age of 88.
Henson took both New Mexico State and Illinois to the Final Four and coached the Aggies to the NCAA's in both of his stints in Las Cruces.
Henson finished his career with 779 victories, which places him sixteenth all-time on the coaches wins list, but his Illinois teams always seemed to lose in the NCAA tournament when his teams seemed to be ready to bust through.
His best Illinois team in 1988-89, won 31 games but lost in the Final Four to Michigan on an offensive rebound putback by the Wolverines after crushing them in each of their two meetings earlier in the season.
The courts at both New Mexico State and Illinois carry Henson's name in tribute.
Goodbye to Rickey Dixon at the age of 53.
Dixon had been suffering from ALS that had left him bed-ridden for several years after a football career that saw him win a Jim Thorpe Award, win a national championship, and eventually would be named to the college football hall of fame from his seasons at Oklahoma as both a cornerback and safety.
Dixon is second all-time on the Oklahoma career interception list and his nine picks in 1987 remain the record for interceptions in a season.
Dixon would be the first-round selection of the Cincinnati Bengals in 1988 as the fifth overall pick and would play five seasons for the Bengals and would retire after the following season that Dixon played for the then-Los Angeles Raiders.
Goodbye to Horace Clarke at the age of 81.
Clarke has been named the "face" of the mediocre era of New York Yankee baseball from 1965 through 1974 when the Yankees tumbled from the elite of the American League to a firm position at the bottom of the standings and parallel the span of the career of Clarke.
Known for his speed and fielding, Clarke's career is remembered for a few different reasons.
Clarke was criticized by Yankee fans for his refusal to hang in at second base and complete double plays as Clarke would hold onto the baseball rather than take the contact of the sliding runner into second base.
Clarke was also mentioned by former Yankee Jim Bouton in Ball Four as the namesake of the "Horace Clarke Memorial Lounge" for the music that Clarke preferred for the training room and would be turned off by Mickey Mantle in favor of Mantle's choice of country music.
Clarke is also one of two players in baseball history ( with Minnesota's Joe Mauer) to break three no-hitters in the ninth inning.
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