SPORTS
A Mother’s Day to remember
It was a happy Mother’s Day for Bowie resident Jan Browning and her family.
Her daughter Tiffany Egenbeacher surprised Browning and her mom with the autograph of Browning’s father, Bobbie Brashear, which was collected more than 70 years ago when he played basketball at Rice University.
“When I originally started looking, it’s because I wanted to surprise my own mother. I was disappointed when I couldn’t find it so it was kind of funny when my daughter found it to give to me,” Browning said.
What culminated on May 10 was a couple of months of good fortune and coincidences.
Back in 2005 Browning’s mother, Verna Mae Brashear, gifted her a book about famous University of California, Los Angeles men’s basketball coach John Wooden called, “The Wizard of Westwood.” Her mother gave it to her because it referenced Verna Mae’s brother, Hollis Johnson, who personally knew Wooden.
Browning admits to never reading the book, but its significance would come out during April of this year once she and her mother started going through her father’s things.
Bobbie passed away in 2017. He was a part of the Jackrabbit basketball program’s first state title in 1951 before playing at Arlington State College and Rice University.
That led to him coaching for some time at local schools Bowie, Saint Jo, Montague and Bellevue, as well as Kincaid in Houston.
While at Rice, the 1953-54 team won the South Western Conference tie-breaker against Texas to qualify for the NCAA playoffs, the equivalent of today’s Sweet Sixteen round in the tournament. During his time at Rice, a 16-year-old boy named Dwight Chapin sent Brashear a letter asking to send him his autograph.
Browning was curious what happened to the young Chapin and to see if he still had her father’s autograph. After looking online, she found out Chapin was a prominent autograph collector of that time period. Research also found he co-authored the book Verna Mae had given her 15 years before.
Her family helped her track down Chapin who is still alive and lives in California. He informed her he had to downsize his autograph collection during the years and sold his 1950s’ college collection.
While tickled at the connection they shared, he was not sure where the autograph would be now. Browning looked on eBay, but came up empty.
Thankfully her daughter picked up the search and was able to find it and surprise both her mother and grandmother on Mother’s Day.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.
The Nocona Lady Indians beat Saint Jo at home on Saturday morning.
The Lady Indians won 16-1 after four innings due to run-rule against the smaller school.
Nocona was coming off a competitive loss at Collinsville earlier in the week while the Lady Panthers were hoping to compete after a busy week of their athletes doing everything else besides just softball.
The Lady Indians easily won the first matchup between the teams in March, 19-2 and it was more of the same on Saturday.
Saint Jo struck first to start the game off well. Jordyn O’Neal hit a one out single. Krista Reeves followed with a walk after O’Neal had stolen second base and had advanced to third thanks to an error trying to throw her out. A wild pitch then allowed her to score to put the Lady Panthers up 1-0.
The lead did not last long. Nocona’s first two batters drew walks which set up Abby Hill to drive them both in with a single to right field.
Despite giving up a single and a walk later in the inning, Saint Jo’s defense did not allow another run. A line out and groundout to the shortstop while picking off a runner attempting to steal got the Lady Panthers out of the inning unscarred.
The Lady Indians led 2-1.
That was about as competitive as it got. In the second inning, Nocona’s bats got going. Two singles and a hit batter loaded the bases up with no outs.
Reagan Phipps drew a walk that drove in a run. Hill hit another two RBI single. Skye Kirby followed with a two RBI double.
After the first out, Allie Sutton drove in one run with a single. There was a fly out for out two, before a runner came in to score after a passed ball. Finally, an error allowed two more runs to score on the base paths.
Nocona had scored nine runs and led 11-1 to break the game open heading into the third inning.
Taylor Patrick hit a double, with O’Neal and Reeves following with singles. Unfortunately for Saint Jo, Patrick was thrown out before the hits attempting to steal a base so the Lady Panthers scored no runs from this.
The Lady Indians kept pouring on the runs. Two singles and a walk loaded the bases up with no outs. Tinley Cable then hit an RBI single. Shelby Swell was hit by a pitch that drove in another run.
After two strikeouts, Evelyn Marquez drove in two more runs on a double to put Nocona up 15-1, coming up one run short of ending the game early.
The Lady Indians scored that one run in the fourth inning. After Phipps drew a leadoff walk, Hill hit a triple that drove her in to end the game.
Nocona won 16-1.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
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