The late Howard Garfinkel had a gift for seeing greatness. He called it something like The Mirror, where he could see a great talent before anyone else did. When he first saw Michael Jordan, he immediately called Street and Smith magazine and tried to get them to include him in their high school profiles, but it was too late. They had already gone to press.
It wasn’t quite like that for us, but before the 2000 season, we went over to campus and wandered into Card Gym (you could do that then) and looked to see who was playing. We saw someone pop a ball loose and take off downcourt like a bolt of lighting and thought: who the heck is that?
It was Alana Beard.
It was immediately obvious that she was different, unbelievably athletic, supremely gifted. In that brief instant, you didn’t have to be Garf. You just got it. You knew she was going to be great. Not good, great. It was obvious and undeniable.
Well, now it’s 2025 and Beard is 43 and retired from basketball and there’s a consensus: she was great. And to prove it, she’s been named to the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame for the Class of 2025.
She was a spectacular talent and from all accounts a really good person as well. Congratulations to Beard for all of her success.
