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Amanda Pape received a lot of awards and recognition during her brilliant career on the basketball court. The former Sacred Heart University star picked up another one Tuesday when she join five other sports figures as the new class for the Fairfield County Sports Hall of Fame.
The Hall of Fame, which is overseen by the Fairfield County Sports Commission, Inc., will honor the newly elected Hall of Famers with an induction ceremony at the Commission's 6th Annual Sports Night awards dinner, Monday, Oct. 18 at the Hyatt Regency Greenwich.
Stratford native John Hirschbeck will join Stamford's Garry Cobb in the Jackie Robinson Professional Wing. Pape and Bridgeport's Alvin Clinkscales will be inducted into the James O'Rourke Amateur Wing. Trumbull's Vito Montelli and Lione will join the J. Walter Kennedy Community Service Wing.
"I'm still kind of in shock,'' said Pape, who played in high school at Trinity Catholic in Stamford. "It's hard to put into words exactly what it means. It's kind of a culmination of everything.
Pape was a four-year starter and a four-time All-FCIAC and All-State selection at Trinity Catholic in Stamford. She led Trinity to a pair of state championships and was named the state's top female player as a senior in 2003. She ended her high school career with 2,429 points, still the highest total for any basketball player-male or female-in Stamford history. In her four seasons at Sacred Heart University she set school records in a myriad of categories, including points (2,045) and steals (362). She was a two-time Northeast Conference scoring leader and won the Player of the Year award in 2006, when she led the Lady Pioneers to a school record 26 wins and their first NEC title and NCAA tournament berth. Pape was inducted into the Connecticut Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010.
Cobb played linebacker in the NFL for 11 seasons for the Detroit Lions, Philadelphia Eagles and Dallas Cowboys. The 1975 graduate of Stamford High also excelled at USC, where he played on a national championship team and two teams that won the Rose Bowl.
Hirschbeck is in his 26th season as a Major League Baseball umpire. He started his big league career in 1984, and when his brother Mark joined him in 1988 they became the first pair of brothers to become Major League umpires. Currently a crew chief, Hirschbeck has worked in 13 post-season baseball playoffs: two World Series (1995 and 2006), four League Championship Series and seven Division Series. A 1972 graduate of Bunnell High in Stratford, he also umpired in a pair of All-Star Games in 1989 and 2004.
Clinkscales was one of the greatest basketball players the city of Bridgeport has ever produced. As a senior at Bridgeport Central he was named all-state and led the Hilltoppers to the New England high school basketball championship. He then played three seasons at Arnold College in Bridgeport, and also played for the Harlem Globetrotters. He also became the first Afro-American coach in the state when he took the boys basketball job at Notre Dame of Bridgeport, where he coached from 1958-68.
Lione had a 30-year coaching career, including 27 at Stamford Catholic/Trinity Catholic High. He was the head coach for the highly successful baseball (1971-98) and hockey programs ('79-'98), winning a combined 731 games in those two sports
Montelli is the state's dean of high school basketball coaches and also its most successful one with a record 830 victories. He is heading into his 49th year as the only head basketball coach ever at St. Joseph's High in Trumbull, where his teams have won nine state championships and finished second six more times.
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