Lucille Kyvallos and Gail Marquis will be front and center of what should be a fun-filled weekend as Queens College inaugurates its Sports Hall of Fame.
Kyvallos is among the handful of pioneers who put women’s basketball on the collegiate, national and international map. Kyvallos will be joined by other women hoops stars from the early ’70s on a whirlwind weekend at Queens College. Events will be highlighted by “Midnight Madness,” which has become a staple of colleges across the country as a tip-off of the collegiate basketball scene.
Most of the activities, which include a soccer match and social events, will be held on the Queens College campus.
Those of you who can stretch your memory will recall Gail Marquis and the great women’s hoops team she played on that memorable 1976 season. That was the year Marquis dropped everything–i.e., school–to try out for the first-ever USA women’s basketball team, she made, returning home with a silver medal, accelerating the pace of women’s basketball in the United States.
Saturday night, Marquis, along with Kyvallos, will be among a hardy group of former Queens College athletes at the Student Union Ballroom. Other inductees are Lou DeLuca, Guido F. Foglin, Margaret “Peg” Franco, Robert Koehler and Donna Orender. Also set for induction are Doug Ress and Robert “Bob” Salmons.
So lock in this Saturday, Oct. 13, and make Queens College your weekend destination. And again, congratulations to all the men and women entering the first-ever Queens College Sports Hall of Fame.