Hall of Fame Class of 2020: The case for Geno Phelps
Phelps (11)
Every week leading up to the reveal of the nominees for the Class of 2020 for the Ultimate Hoops Hall of Fame, we’ll feature a possible candidate for the upcoming induction class. None of these articles will focus on anyone who has already been nominated for the Hall of Fame but has yet to be inducted. If you want to learn more about those candidates, you can visit the Hall of Fame section of our blog.
Today we’re focusing on two-time national champion Geno Phelps.
The case for Phelps
The main reason Phelps will be considered for the Hall of Fame is his construction of the original UH dynasty: the Bulls. In 2012 and 2013, the Las Vegas National Tournament was dominated by the Bulls; they were Ball So Hard before Ball So Hard. They won back-to-back national titles in those two years, compiling a 12-0 record with an average margin of victory of 16.9 points.
These were much different tournaments than what we’ve come to expect the National Tournament to be over the past few years. There were no former NBA players, no teams quite as stacked as Ball So Hard or X Over, but the Bulls certainly had stiff competition.
In the championship game in 2012, the Bulls defeated fellow Minnesota team Ed Rooney 67-65. Ed Rooney boasted first-ballot UH Hall of Famer Ryan Jansen, along with two-time nominee Dustin Dupont and other UH Minnesota legends such as Michael Byrne and Bryan Munsell.
In the championship game in 2013, the Bulls defeated The Decision 71-70 in the infamous “Block or Charge” game. The Decision were led by Anthony Byrd, who would go on to win Tournament MVP honors in 2014, when The Decision won the title (in a year when the Bulls did not participate).
The Bulls have not won a national title since 2013, but they did not fall too far off since then. They defeated Ball So Hard 48-47 in 2015 in pool play, but would lose to them in the championship game in both 2015 and 2016.
Phelps has had good success in Minnesota as well, winning three open titles, two rec titles and one rec-plus title. Some may argue that a few of those titles were just as hard, if not harder to win than the national titles. His Bulls South won the Bloomington South Rec title in the Summer of 2013 in a playoff with 24 teams. His three open titles also came in the combined playoff format, when the St. Louis Park, Target Center and Plymouth leagues would combine. During the Bulls’ dominant national runs in 2012-13, Phelps famously said that it was harder to win a Minnesota open title than it was to win a national title.
The case against Phelps
Phelps is going to have a similar problem that L.C. Comine will have in that they both don’t bolster great stats. Phelps has career averages of 5.5 points, 4.2 rebounds and 1.6 assists on 47% shooting. That won’t add to his resume, and that makes it harder to get votes from outside your own region. But quality general managers are key to success in UH leagues, and that’s especially true in open and rec leagues, where you recruit all of your own players and create your own team. That can not only affect the success of your own team, but it can also help the health of a league to bring in more players, and in Phelps’ case, bring in more talented players to raise the competition of the leagues he’s involved in.
It’ll be interesting to see how the nominations shape out for candidates out of Minnesota. Dupont, Chris Maher and Sonny Young-Graves have all been nominated before, so you’d imagine they’ll all have a good chance of being nominated again. That will significantly affect Phelps’ chances and the many other UH Minnesota players and contributors that will be considered.