By MARK PARKER
HICKORY — In recognition of their achievements in sports in Catawba County, the Hickory Metro Sports Commission is proud to announce five new members and a Team of Distinction to the Catawba County Sports Hall of Fame (CCSHOF) for the class of 2025.
This year’s inductees include former Fred T. Foard High and Lenoir-Rhyne University basketball standout Alanda Danner Johnson, Bandys alumnus and college basketball coach Bobby Lutz, former Hickory Foundation YMCA swimming coach Jon Jolley, NASCAR driver Morgan Shepherd, and former Bunker Hill High head football coach Randy Faucette.
The CCSHOF also selected the 1974-75 Fred T. Foard girls basketball team as this year’s “Team of Distinction”.
“The committee is very honored to have such an outstanding class of athletes and coaches being inducted into the class of 2025,” said Frank Snider, chairman of the CCSHOF committee. “It was a difficult decision as there were many qualified nominees. We hope the sports fans of Catawba County will continue to support our awards ceremony and banquet in May.”
Bobby Lutz, a star athlete at Bandys High (Classs of 1976) and successful college basketball coach, leads the Catawba County Sports Hall of Fame’s Class of 2025. Lutz is retired and lives in Denver, N.C.
Lutz played baseball and boys basketball at Bandys through 1976. He was captain of the basketball team in his senior season, as well as an all-Conference performer in baseball that same year.
He went on to make his mark as a head backetball coach in North Carolina. He led Parkwood High’s girls’ team to a state 2A title in 1983, the youngest coach at the time to win a state title.
Lutz spent 11 seasons (1985-95) with the men’s basketball team at Pfeiffer College, posting a 180-89 record, which included 11 conference championships, three NAIA Final Four appearances and the national runner-up in 1995.
He took on the head coach’s job at UNC Charlotte from 1998 to 2010, leading the 49ers to five NCAA tournament appearances. Lutz has since held assistant coaching jobs at Iowa State, N. C. State, Nebraska and Ole Miss.
Johnson capped a stellar career at Fred T. Foard by leading the Tigers to a state 3A championship. Captain of that squad, she was named all-conference and cleared 1,000 points for her career.
She also has school records in the 100m, 200m and 400m in outdoor track., and was named Foard’s “Female Athlete of the Year” in 1992.
Johnson went on to score 1,047 in four seasons at Lenoir-Rhyne and remains in the top 10 in school history in career steals.
Honored posthumously, Jolley was an integral part of the swimming community after taking on the role as head coach for the Hickory Foundation’s YMCA Seahorse Swim Team (YSST) in 1996.
Jolley was named Coach of the Year in NC Swimming five times from 2013 to 2021. His 2016 YMCA women’s team won the national championship, and he coached nine individual YMCA national champions.
Three of Jolley’s swimmers were qualifiers at the Olympic Trials. YSST swimmer and CCSHOF member Ross Dant represented the U.S. at the Junior Pan-Pacific Championships in Fiji, winning two golds and a bronze medal in 2018.
Shepherd began a long and distinguished racing career in 1967 at Hickory Motor Speedway. A year later, he won 21 of 29 races. He went on to 1,027 starts in NASCAR Series races over a 44-year career, including 517 NASCAR Cup Series races.
Shepherd’s last start came in 2014 at the age of 77, the oldest driver to compete in a NASCAR series event. Overall, he won four NASCAR Cup Series races and 15 Xfinity races. From 1990 to 1995, Shepherd was in the top 14 of the Cup Series standings each season with a fifth-place finish in 1990. He had five top-ten finishes at the Daytona 500, including a runner-up spot in 1992.
Faucette was a two-sport athlete at St. Stephens High in the mid-1960s. After attending Appalachian State, he returned to Catawba County at various assistant football coaching roles at Bandys and Fred T. Foard.
Faucette made his mark at Bunker Hill, leading the Bears to an 88-78 record over 15 seasons from 1986-2001. Faucette’s teams made the playoffs seven times, highlighted with a district championship in 1987, when he was named the Southern District 7 Conference Coach of the Year.
Faucette was selected to coach in the East-West football game in 1990. He was also the head baseball coach at Bandys in 1976 and 1977 with an appearance in the state playoffs in ’77.
In just the fourth NCHSAA playoffs for girls’ basketball, Fred T. Foard won the “Open Classification” in 1975 with a 75-73 win over Jamestown Ragsdale High.
Led by coach Robert Stamey, the Tigers went 28-1, capped by the championship. In the state final, Sally Reid led the Tigers with 27 points, while Cathy Copas and Debbie Bollinger each had 22. Reid – the Southern District 7 MVP with 22.4 points per game — and Susan Copas were selected to East-West All-Star games in 1975 and 1976.
As part of the CCSHOF induction ceremony, the HMSC will once again recognize the top male and female scholar-athletes from each of the public and private schools throughout Catawba County. The top male and female scholar-athletes will each receive $1,500.00 to go towards a scholarship in their name to their college or university of their choice.
The induction ceremony is scheduled May 12 at the Highland Recreation Center. Tickets for the event are $40 and can be purchased beginning March 3 at Highland Rec., or by calling 828-322-7046. Tickets are also available at area high schools. For more information, contact Candy Mashburn at cmashburn@hickorync.gov.