By Eric Stock
ST. LOUIS – Much of the attention on Arch Madness weekend is on the Illinois State men’s basketball team, but the Missouri Valley Conference is taking time to honor a legend of the women’s game.
Charlotte Lewis, a former Redbird star and Olympian was inducted into the MVC Hall of Fame on Friday in St. Louis.
Her coach, Hall-of-Famer, Jill Hutchison told WJBC’s Scott Laughlin and Patti Penn, Lewis used her raw athletic ability to dominate on the court – as she didn’t play basketball in high school.
“For her to have made that leap from that to the Olympics in ’76 is kind of mind boggling,” Hutchison said. “That tells you what a tremendous athlete she really was.”
Lewis died in 2007 at age 52. Lewis owns nearly all of the ISU women rebounding records and is one of only three players in ISU women’s basketball history to have her jersey retired.
Lewis become the 11th Illinois State representative in the MVC Hall of Fame, joining Kenneth “Buzz” Shaw (1998), Doug Collins (1998), Cathy Boswell (2003), Will Robinson (2003), Jill Hutchison (2008), John Coughlan (2009), Linda Herman (2014), D.A. Weibring (2015), Dave Bergman (2016) and Sue Daggett Miller (2016).
Eric Stock can be reached at [email protected].