Falcon Basketball.....the time is now. RETIRE #30

Tom Walton, BG Alum, major Falcon fan, and former editor of The Blade is back a second time calling for BGSU to retire Butch Komives' number 30 at Bowling Green.

Komives was an incredibly great player, as I noted when he passed recently.

Here's a bit from Walton's article that I didn't know...

During my phone conversation with Butch last year, he related a story about one of his often-overlooked accomplishments - his streak of 50 consecutive successful free throws. Then he missed one, though he promptly began another streak of 25 in a row. "There was a problem with the one I missed," he explained. "We were playing at Marshall and a photographer under the basket took a flash picture just as I shot."

The flash, he said, cost him his streak. He wasn't making excuses. I'm convinced he was simply expressing the shooter's mentality that made him great. When the ball rolled off the fingertips of his left hand, whether from the free-throw line or from 26 feet, he expected it to go in.

Yep. That's a great basketball player, dedicated to his craft.

Bowling Green should recognize it. They should retire #30 at the beginning of the next season, with the Komives family in attendance. It is simply the right thing to do.

I understand that we don't have written standards for retiring numbers. We should do that. But if we actually write any standards that wouldn't allow us to retire Komives' number, than they need to be looked at again. Right?

I always fun of the New York Yankees, who retire numbers like it is going out of style. But, two is not too many. And Komives was a great player, and his accomplishments have stood the test of time. After all, nearly a half century later, we are still talking about them.

So, no delay. Retire #30 now.