JOHN WALLACE #44
Written by Atu on March 2, 2020
This leap year, Saturday, February 29, 2020, Syracuse University honored “Big John aka J Dub” with being the 15th SU basketball player to have his jersey retired during a home game against North Carolina.
I can’t believe I just witnessed this occurrence. Not because it was a surprise to me but, I actually thought it had already happened a long time ago. Maybe that was Derrick Coleman, who had it just before Wallace.
This honor is obviously very well deserved for him, especially since he closed his four year college career by leading the SU Varsity team to the 1996 NCAA championship! The All-American John Wallace, New York’s “Mr. Basketball” also lead his high school team, Greece Athena Trojans, to a state championship in 1992.
– Shout out Coach Sully (Sean Sullivan) and Eric Schmidt “Schmidy”!
I actually recall John being an NBA first-round draft pick the same year as Kobe Bryant, among other notables.
This, my friends, was the only time I EVER had full interest in sports, outside of Michael Jordan and Mike Tyson. So, congratulations to ‘Da Man’ once again and here’s a nice memory I enjoyed in that exciting time period.
