ST. LOUIS — Long-time Missouri State University athletics administrator and coaching great Bill Rowe has been named to the 2018 Missouri Valley Conference Hall of Fame class, the league announced Thursday.
Rowe will be joined by women’s athletics pioneer Lois Patton of Evansville; softball Olympian Dani Tyler of Drake; two former track/cross country standouts in Mary Ellen Hill-Schupbach (Bradley) and Christian Goy (Illinois State); and Southern Illinois’ Darren Brooks, the only player in league history to win both the Larry Bird Trophy and men’s basketball Defensive Player of the Year honor twice.
The six MVC standouts will be honored at the league’s 21st annual induction ceremony on Friday, March 2 in St. Louis. The festivities will begin with an 8 a.m. breakfast, followed by the induction ceremony at 8:30 a.m. at the Peabody Opera House, adjacent to Scottrade Center.
“The individuals we will be honoring in the Class of 2018 are representative of the men and women who have preceded them in our Hall of Fame,” said Commissioner Doug Elgin. “They’ve brought significant honor to themselves, their institutions and to the Conference. We are truly humbled to have this opportunity to salute them for their achievements. In a year in which we are celebrating 25 years of women’s athletics in the MVC, we’re excited to announce our six-person class, which includes three women who positively impacted women’s athletics at their institutions.”
Rowe retired from Missouri State in 2009 after 52 years in service to the institution. He entered MSU as a freshman in 1957 and capped a career in which he served as head baseball coach and athletics business manager for 19 years before taking over as director of athletics in 1982 upon the school’s move to NCAA Division I status. Notably, his AD tenure matched the longest in school history and his work was vital in making Missouri State a charter member of the Association of Mid-Continent Universities when that league was founded in 1982. He later spearheaded the effort for MSU’s invitation to join the MVC in 1990.
Rowe received Missouri State’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008. He also earned an MSU Outstanding Alumnus Award in 1988 and was placed on the institution’s Wall of Fame in 2015. He was the 2004 recipient of the MVC’s John Sanders Spirit of the Valley Award and is a member of five Halls of Fame, including the Springfield Area Sports Hall of Fame, American Association of Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame, National Association of College Directors of Athletics Hall of Fame, MSU Athletics Hall of Fame and Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. In May 2016, Rowe was honored as the 34th person to become a Missouri Sports Legend by Missouri Sports Hall of Fame
Rowe was the first person to have his MSU baseball jersey retired, and the indoor training facility at Missouri State’s Hammons Field is named the Bill Rowe Training Center.
As head baseball coach, he took seven Bears’ teams to the NCAA Division II Tournament, including four that reached the Division II World Series. He also produced the Bears’ first two Major League players and had four-year terms on NCAA championship committees for baseball and football, while also serving as chair of the NCAA Baseball Rules Committee.
MSU teams won nearly 100 conference regular-season and tournament championships in his years as AD, with some 50 postseason team appearances and more than 80 individual NCAA qualifiers. Rowe’s continuous work with fundraising and facility upgrades included improvements to nearly every sport venue and support facility and culminated with his work on the 11,000-seat JQH Arena which opened in 2018.
Rowe is the 11th MVC Hall of Fame selection representing Missouri State. He joins Melody Howard (2009), John Q. Hammons (2000), Jackie Stiles (2007), Mark Stillwell (2008), Jimmy Wright (2009), Cheryl Burnett (2010), Charlie Spoonhour (2012), Linda Dollar (2015), Bill Thomas (2016) and Dr. Mary Jo Wynn (2016). MSU has been honored with an inductee each of the last four years.
Tickets to the 2018 Hall of Fame event can be obtained by calling the league office at (314) 444-4300. Tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis.
