Richard Hyatt: Looking back on a mirror image
There is a sad irony that the announcement that the floor at the Frank Lumpkin Center will be named for Herbert Greene came now, because 11 years ago this week one of the former Columbus State University basketball coach’s favorite players hit that floor and never got up.
Greene remembers the unnerving thud as Jed Bedford's lifeless body crumbled to the floor, and even now the memory of that sound makes him wince.
He can take you to the spot on the floor where the 21-year-old team captain went down during a routine practice session.
Within an hour, he was pronounced dead by doctors at St. Francis Hospital.
Eleven years and one day later, CSU announced that on Jan. 3 that floor will be named for Greene -- a fixture on the CSU bench for 25 seasons and 481 victories.
"That makes me want to jump up and down," said Greene, executive director of the Columbus Sports Council since 2008.
His daughter Olivia, a classically trained vocalist, will sing the national anthem at the naming ceremony, just as she did when the Lumpkin Center was dedicated in 2000. She and her sister, Maria, grew up scampering around that court.
But the pride his family feels is shared with memories of Bedford.
They understand the impact his death had on Greene.
The sound he heard that day was unlike any he had ever heard in a gym, Greene told Ledger-Enquirer columnist Troy Johnson.
"The sound ... he dropped behind me. You know when folks fall and they're catching themselves? This wasn't that. That sound ... it just rings. It just rings."
Bedford was a mirror image of Greene. They were fellow gym rats who were about the same size and each was born with a shooter's mentality, believing that the next one was going in.
That's why many people in the Lumpkin Center the day Bedford died smile when they say he nailed a long jump shot just before he went down -- as if that was the way he would have wanted it.
Bedford and Yarnel Brown made up an unforgettable backcourt tandem that rivaled any in the country in 2003.
But losing the team leader took away the joy and Greene was never the same.
Bedford's heart was two times larger than it should have been, so there was nothing anyone could have done to save him. But when Greene retired two years later, he was haunted by a conviction that he needed to do more to protect his players.
The tears Herbert Greene shed for his players 11 years ago are reason enough to put his name on that basketball court, and so is the love he showed for Gerald Jed Bedford.
-- Richard Hyatt is an independent correspondent. Reach him at hyatt31906@knology.net.
This story was originally published December 16, 2014 at 7:42 PM with the headline "Richard Hyatt: Looking back on a mirror image."