The Missouri Valley Conference has announced its 2024 Hall of Fame Class.

The 27th MVC Hall of Fame class features baseball great Curtis Granderson of UIC; the all-time leading tackler in FCS history in Boomer Grigsby of Illinois State; track & field All-American Christy Barrett Sherman of Indiana State; men’s basketball coaching legend Nolan Richardson of Tulsa; nationally renowned administrator Bob Bowlsby; and the 2024 Paul Morrison Award recipient: Tom Lamonica of Illinois State. Including this year’s six inductees, the MVC Hall of Fame consists of 151 former student-athletes, administrators, coaches, and contributors.

The league will conduct its annual Hall of Fame ceremony as part the State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Men’s Basketball Championship in St. Louis, Mo., next March 7-10. The Friday, March 8, festivities will begin with an 8:00 a.m. breakfast, followed by the induction ceremony at 8:30 a.m.

Tickets to the 2024 Hall of Fame event, which will be held at Stifel Theatre -- adjacent to Enterprise Center – can be obtained by contacting the league office at (314) 444-4300. Tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis.

The 2024 State Farm MVC Tournament marks the 34th-straight year the event has been staged in St. Louis.  With 34-consecutive years at the same neutral site, Arch Madness is the second-longest neutral site tenured collegiate tourney in the nation (following only the Big East in New York City).  It marks the 30th anniversary for the tournament at Enterprise Center.

“One of the great rewards that comes with representing a Conference with the magnitude of the Missouri Valley is the opportunity to interact with some of the finest practitioners in the collegiate athletic space,” said Commissioner Jeff Jackson.  “This class represents the reach of The Valley in and away from the athletic arena.  We are all truly inspired by their achievements and touched by their grace.”

CHRISTY BARRETT SHERMAN, INDIANA STATE (1988-91)
A four-time NCAA Track & Field All-America selection, Christy Barrett Sherman excelled in the shot put as a student-athlete at Indiana State from 1988-91.  She earned no fewer than three Gateway Conference outdoor crowns, winning the shot put competition in 1989, 1990 and 1991 and was a two-time NCAA Outdoor All-America in the shot put (1990 and 1991).  Barrett Sherman also won the Gateway Conference Outdoor title in discus in 1990. 
Equally skilled when competing indoors, Barrett Sherman was a three-time NCAA runner-up (1990 and 1991), earning All-America honors both seasons, as well as also being the Gateway Conference Indoor Champion in 1990 and 1991.  She took sixth place in the NCAA indoor shot put in 1990. Barrett Sherman set the Indiana State indoor record in the shot put with a distance of 55-5 1/2” in 1991, as well as the outdoor mark in that event with a distance of 56-10 3/4” in 1991, both records were broken in 2013 by Olympian Felisha Johnson.
A member of the Missouri Valley Conference All-Centennial Team, she was inducted into the Indiana State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2000.
An elementary school teacher for the past 30 years in Vigo and Parke County, Christy remains active with the PS We Love You campaign, fighting childhood cancer. She is in her 20th year as throws coach at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Ind..  Rose-Hulman has won 27 of the last 29 Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference Championships.

BOB BOWLSBY, UNI (LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT)
Bob Bowlsby’s long-tenured career has its roots at the University of Northern Iowa where he served as Director of Athletics from 1983-1991. He managed UNI’s entry into the Missouri Valley Conference (1991-92) and increased the program’s fundraising by 400 percent.
Bowlsby formulated this UNI Athletics Hall of Fame program, the first class of which was inducted in 1985. Bowlsby was inducted into UNI’s Hall of Fame in 2004.
Earlier this month, Bowlsby agreed to serve as Interim Athletic Director for the Panthers. He currently serves as a member of the steering committee for UNI’s $250 million Our Tomorrow Campaign that has raised over $243 million to date.
A native of Waterloo, Iowa, he became the University of Iowa’s 10th men’s athletic director in June 1991. He directed the merger of the Hawkeye men’s and women’s athletic programs into a single unit in 2000 supervising 24 sports. In addition, he oversaw the planning, construction and renovation of more than $100 million in campus projects, including the refurbishing of Kinnick Stadium. In 2006, he became director of athletics at Stanford University.
In 2012, he was hired to be commissioner of the Big 12 Conference. Over his tenure, the Big 12 won 25 NCAA team national championships. In 2020-21 the Big 12 captured five NCAA team national championships, including a Baylor University men’s basketball title. Also, for four consecutive years, the Big 12 placed men’s basketball teams in the Final Four. In football, the Big 12 placed teams in the College Football Playoff New Year’s Bowls throughout its seven-year history. The Big 12 is the home of two of the last five Heisman Trophy winners and was the only Conference to place a team in the Final Four and CFP semifinals in 2017-18 and 2018-19.
Before retiring from the Big 12 in 2022, he earned the reputation as one of the nation’s most respected, energetic and ambitious athletic administrators. The National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) named him Central Region Athletic Director of the Year and Sports Business Journal selected him from the four regional award winners as the National Athletics Director of the Year in 2001-02. He was appointed to the 15-member United States Commission on Opportunities in Athletics by U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige in 2002-03.
Bowlsby also served as President of the Division I-A Athletic Directors’ Association from 2002-03 and in 2005 he finished a five-year term on the NCAA Division I Basketball Tournament Committee. He served as the chairman in 2003-04.
Additional professional experiences include serving as an ex officio member of the NCAA Executive Committee; and chairing the NCAA Wrestling Committee, the NCAA Olympic Sports Liaison Committee and the Big Ten Championships and Awards Committee. He was a member of the NACDA Executive Committee and the I-A Athletics Directors’ Association Executive Committee.
Bowlsby earned his Bachelor’s of Science degree from Moorhead State in 1975 and his Master of Arts from Iowa in 1978. He was Assistant Director of Recreational Services at Iowa from 1978-81 and was named UNI’s Assistant Director of Athletics for Facilities from 1981-83. He then replaced Stan Sheriff as the Panthers’ athletics director while serving as administrative head of the UNI-Dome. 

CURTIS GRANDERSON, UIC (2000-02)
Curtis Granderson was a star baseball player at UIC and in the majors.
The 2002 Horizon League Player of the Year, Granderson established single-season program records that stand today for batting average (.483 – also second nationally), hits (100) and runs (76) that season.  He earned second-team All-America honors from Baseball America and USA Today’s Baseball Weekly, and third-team All-America accolades from Louisville Slugger. In addition to those single-season marks from 2002, Granderson still holds the UIC record with 178 career runs scored.
Granderson was drafted by the Detroit Tigers in the third round of the 2002 Major League Baseball Draft and made his debut with the parent club in 2004.  He played in more than 2,000 games and 60 post-season contests for seven teams across 16 seasons in Major League Baseball.
He played for teams that reached the World Series in 2006 (Tigers), 2015 (Mets) and 2017 (Dodgers) and was a three-time Major League Baseball All-Star in 2009 (Tigers), 2011 (Yankees), and 2012 (Yankees).
In 2011, Granderson earned the Silver Slugger Award and finished fourth in MVP voting while with the New York Yankees.  He is one of only four players in Major League Baseball history to be part of the extremely rare 20-20-20-20 Club, pulling off that feat with the Tigers in 2007 (38 doubles, 23 triples, 23 home runs and 26 stolen bases).  The only others in this elite group are Hall of Famer Willie Mays (1957 – N.Y. Giants), Jimmy Rollins (2007 – Phillies) and Frank Schulte (1911 – Cubs).
His 23 triples in 2007 remain the most by any Major League Baseball player in one season in nearly 75 years (23 by Cleveland’s Dale Mitchell in 1949).
Granderson earned Major League Baseball’s Roberto Clemente Award in 2016, an honor bestowed to the player who best represents the game of baseball through sportsmanship, community involvement and positive contributions, both on and off the field.  He also earned the Lou Gehrig Memorial Award in 2015 as the MLB player who best exemplifies the spirit and character of Lou Gehrig, both on and off the field.
A four-time recipient of the MLB Players’ Association’s Marvin Miller Man of the Year Award, Granderson created the non-profit Grand Kids Foundation as an active player in 2007 to promote youth development through education, physical fitness and nutrition, and he served as MLB spokesperson for the White House’s “Let’s Move” campaign and the “Drink Up” water initiative.
Granderson donated $5 million to UIC to fund construction of Curtis Granderson Stadium.  Now in its 10th season, Granderson Stadium is not only the home of the Flames baseball program, but it also serves as a place to learn and play the game to countless youth teams and organizations around Chicago. Thousands of inner-city youth throughout the Chicagoland community utilize the state-of-the-art facility via the Chicago Baseball & Educational Academy.
He serves as President of The Players Alliance, a group that addresses baseball’s systemic barriers to equity and inclusion by creating pathways to opportunities on and off the field for an undeniable pipeline of Black talent.
Granderson graduated from UIC with his degree in business administration and business marketing. He was inducted into the Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame in 2021 and UIC Athletics Hall of Fame in 2008. UIC also officially retired his No. 28 during the 2013 season.

BOOMER GRIGSBY, ILLINOIS STATE (2001-04)
Grigsby is a four-year letterwinner for the Redbirds while playing for Illinois State football from 2001-04.  A three-time Missouri Valley Football Conference Defensive Player of the Year (2002-03-04), he remains the only player in league history to accomplish the feat.
He was a three-time Buck Buchanan Award finalist (2002-03-04), an award given to the nation’s top NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) defensive player; he finished second in the Buchanan voting in 2003 and third in both 2002 and 2004, as the only player in the history of the award to finish in the top-three for three-consecutive years.
Grigsby owns the NCAA FCS, Missouri Valley Football Conference, and the Illinois State career tackles records with 580.
A consensus FCS All-American in both 2003 and 2004, he was voted an All-American by the Sports Network for three-straight years (2002, 2003 and 2004).
Following his playing days at ISU, Grigsby played three seasons in the NFL, after being drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs in the 2005 NFL Draft, and he also played for the Miami Dolphins and Houston Texans.
Grigsby was named to both the MVFC All-Select NFL Team and Silver Anniversary Team.  For all his accomplishments, the National Defensive Player of the Year Award presented by College Sporting News was named in honor of Grigsby.
A member of the Canton High School Hall of Fame, he was inducted into the Illinois State Athletics Percy Family Hall of Fame in 2010, and he became a member of the 2022 College Football Hall of Fame Class -- he’s the only football player in Gateway/MVFC history to earn the honor.
He has volunteered with Jared Allen’s Homes for Wounded Warriors and the Special Olympics, while Grigsby continued his relationship with ISU football as the color analyst for Redbird football broadcasts on NBC Sports Chicago for three seasons, and he served as a television analyst for Illinois High School Association football playoff broadcasts for two years. He currently works in Las Vegas as a sales representative for Stryker.

TOM LAMONICA (MORRISON AWARD RECIPIENT)
For more than 48 years, former Illinois State University sports information director and current communication faculty member Tom Lamonica has combined his interest in sports, his love for communication and his passion for teaching, often in support of the Missouri Valley Conference.
His sports information career began in 1975 at College of DuPage and continued at the University of Evansville after the tragic 1977 Aces basketball team plane crash.
Lamonica arrived at Illinois State from Evansville in time to help with the Redbirds’ application for membership in the Valley in 1980. His SID work over more than 26 years at ISU included football, men’s and women’s basketball and volleyball at different times. Concurrently, he taught two classes per year in the ISU School of Communication (SoC) and worked with hundreds of SoC student interns and graduate students in Redbird Athletics Communications. 
In 2006, he retired from Redbird athletics to join the ISU SoC faculty full-time, but stayed connected to the Valley as a staff member at Arch Madness and all 17 Hoops in the Heartland tournaments. Lamonica also has worked at 24 NCAA Basketball Tournament sites—including two Final Fours in St. Louis, hosted by the Valley.
During Arch Madness in St. Louis, he has supported MVC TV Network productions, as well as embracing the role of “de facto maître d” for the Valley Hall of Fame selections during their induction weekend in St. Louis. 
During the 2022-23 academic year, as part of the league’s Celebration of Title IX, Lamonica researched, interviewed and wrote profiles of pivotal pioneer personnel to recognize their trailblazing actions as vital administrators in the evolution of league women’s athletics.
He continues in the SoC at Illinois State, teaching public relations and sport communication, while leading the school’s award-winning internship program.
Tom and his wife, retired ISU administrator and English faculty member Dr. Claire Coleman Lamonica, are the parents of three and grandparents of four. They stay active as Redbird fans, support ISU campus initiatives and volunteer in the Bloomington-Normal community.

NOLAN RICHARDSON (TULSA, 1980-85)
Richardson coached five years in the Missouri Valley Conference at the University of Tulsa and in his first year there in 1980-81, he took the program from a last-place finish to an NIT title while earning the first of his two MVC Coach of the Year honors.  He compiled a 119-37 record at Tulsa for a .763 winning percentage and was 59-23 in his five seasons in MVC play; leading the Golden Hurricane to three NCAA and two NIT appearances.
The first Black coach to win an NIT, Richardson also became the first coach in NCAA history to win 50 games in his first two seasons as he compiled a 50-13 mark in his first two seasons at Tulsa.
Following his five-year stint at Tulsa, Richardson spent the next 17 seasons at the University of Arkansas, where he led the Hogs to 15 post-season appearances and a 1994 NCAA Championship.  In addition to the 1994 national title, Richardson had two additional Final Four appearances at Arkansas (1990, 1995). 
Richardson was NABC Coach of the Year (1994); Naismith College Coach of the Year (1994); a two-time MVC Coach of the Year (1981, 1985); three-time Southwest Conference Coach of the Year (1989–1991); SEC Coach of the Year (1998); and a USBWA Most Courageous Award winner (1995). 
He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2014; the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008; and the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Foundation Hall of Fame in 2023.
Richardson is the winningest basketball coach in Arkansas history, compiling a 389-169 (.697) record in 17 seasons. He is the only head coach to win a Junior College National Championship, the NIT Championship, and the NCAA Championship. Richardson began his coaching career in 1968 at Bowie High School in El Paso. He coached there for 10 years before returning to the two-year college level at Western Texas Junior College in 1977. At Western Texas, he posted a record of 101-13 in three seasons.  In his third and final season, Richardson led the Westerners to the 1980 NJCAA Men’s Basketball Championship with a 37-0 record.  Western Texas became just the third team to finish the season with an undefeated record in the history of NJCAA basketball.
Born and raised in El Paso, Texas, Richardson played basketball collegiately at NJCAA member Eastern Arizona Junior College for one season before transferring to Texas Western College. After Western, he retired from playing and decided to leave his mark through coaching.