Best and the Brightest
Published 9:00 pm Monday, July 25, 2005
The cities and towns that make up Snohomish County have turned out thousands of talented athletes in a never-ending cycle, sending them to big-time colleges and professional ranks in almost every sport imaginable.
Our job? To pare them down and come up with the 50 best. It was a cumbersome task that would undoubtedly leave some qualified athletes on the outside looking in.
| The Herald unveils its picks for the top 50 athletes in Snohomish County history in a six-part series that begins today. Who do you think should top the list? Send us your top five choices and we’ll print readers’ lists at the conclusion of the series. The lists can be e-mailed to sports@heraldnet.com. |
The easiest cuts were the geographical ones. Stars like synchronized swimmer Tracie Ruiz-Conforto (Bothell), soccer player Michelle Akers (Shoreline) and the multi-talented Tuiasosopo family (Woodinville) all lived a few miles outside of the county line, making them ineligible for the Top 50.
Then there were the ones like Olympic gold medalists Kaye Hall Greff and Paul Enquist who moved to Snohomish County after they had achieved athletic success, and distance runner Vicki Foltz, who won a national title while living in Snohomish after moving from her native Yugoslavia in the 1960s.
We weren’t interested in these athletes as much as we were the ones who grew up in Snohomish County. Athletes who lived in the county during their childhood and high school years were the only ones considered. Not all of them actually played for high schools within the county borders, but they at least lived in Snohomish County.
That still left us with far too many candidates to possibly pare down by ourselves. So we called in the biggest names we knew.
Through careful research, we came up with a list of more than 100 of the greatest athletes in county history, then turned it over to a panel of so-called experts. Ballots were passed out to eight people with a lot of experience in Snohomish County sports: Snohomish football coach/basketball coach/historian Keith Gilbertson Sr., longtime college basketball coach and Lake Stevens resident Marv Harshman, former University of Washington crew coach Jan Harville, former Herald sports columnist Larry Henry, Everett High School athletic director Jo Levin, former Marysville-Pilchuck basketball coach Mike Lowery, county historian Larry O’Donnell and former Mountlake Terrace basketball coach Roger Ottmar.
All of them spent hours poring through the list of names, giving us their rankings, and we added it all up for our original top 50.
The Herald’s four most recent sports editors – Henry, Kirby Arnold, Bob Bolerjack and current sports editor Kevin Brown, who have a combined XX years of Snohomish County sportswriting – then made slight adjustments on that list to come up with the final 50.
Our criteria involved an athlete’s achievement in his or her main sport, his or her overall athletic ability, and the success the athlete had in his or her generation. We did not take coaching accolades into account and tried not to put too much weight on the difficulty of one sport over another.
While we regret having to leave so many qualified names off the list, The Herald is proud to present its Top 50 Athletes in Snohomish County History. Today’s installation will begin the countdown from No. 50, unveiling 10 athletes per day. On Sunday, we will name one of Snohomish County’s countless athletic stars as the greatest in history.
We hope you enjoy the list and look forward to any input you might have as the week unfolds.
