Friends and family paid tribute to the college basketball icon in Spokane. Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo, who was hired by the WSU grad and former West Valley coach, gave a beautiful remembrance of Heathcote.
This is an absolutely beautiful tribute to Jud Heathcote. I love the part where Izzo finds a notepad in the office Jud had just vacated when he retired. On it were 74 things to remember. The first was to treat your secretary well and the third was to treat the janitor well. I love that. Izzo's conclusion had me in tears.
I remember one time after open gym in Jenison in the summer of 92. The basketball team would play interspersed with a bunch of scrubs and some not so scrubs from the area. I was a senior at MSU who knew some guys on the team and would get to play and hang out with them. It was about 8:35 and all the games had just ended. The lights typically would go off at about 8:45 and everyone would head their way. I was shooting around with some other guys. I must have missed about 20-30 shots in a row. Jud saunters by and not even looking at me says, in his nasally voice, God bless him, "well, we'll turn off the lights at quarter to or when you make a shot, whichever comes first!" I couldn't help but break up laughing inside. He touched everyone, even this scrub.
