From the Post...
Former Powell Valley High athlete Thomas Jones and Castlewood's Calvin Talford will be among 11 individuals who have made outstanding contributions to high school athletic and activity programs and have been selected to the 2008 Virginia High School Hall of Fame.
Members of the Class of 2008, the 19th to be inducted, will bring total membership to 198. The Class of 2008 includes three athletes "? Jones, Talford and James Robinson High graduate and World Cup soccer champion Megan McCarthy. Powell Valley's Jones will join his late uncle Edd Clark as a hall of fame member. Clark, who was a standout at Appalachia, was an inductee in the charter class in 1990.
Other members of the class of 2008 are coaches Roger Bergey, Shelly Blumenthal, Patricia Mitchell and Jim Rike with contributors Martha Akers, Jeff Dietze, Ralph Law and Charlene Tiller.
Sponsored jointly by the Virginia High School League and the Virginia High School Coaches Association, the hall is dedicated to preserving the rich heritage of outstanding achievements by students and adults in sports and activities within Virginia's public high schools.
Athletes are eligible for consideration 10 years after completion of their high school careers and are judged primarily for their achievements in interscholastic sports.
Coaches are eligible after 15 years of experience or upon retirement and are judged on the merits of their achievements at the high school level. Contributors are professionals who have rendered significant services in some other capacity such as administration, academic activities, officiating, media or sports medicine.
The induction dinner will be held on Monday, October 27 at the DoubleTree Hotel in Charlottesville. The honorees are as follows:
Jones led Powell Valley to back-to-back VHSL Groupa A football championships in 1994-95. In leading the Vikings to two state titles, he finished his prolific football career first and third in the VHSL record book in single-season rushing with 3,319 yards as a junior and 3,007 yards during his senior year. He also set a single-game rushing mark with 462 yards, stood first in career touchdowns with 104, second in single-season scoring with 296 points and second in both career scoring (638 points) and career rushing yards (7,193 yards). In addition, he guided Powell Valley to a VHSL track championship and was named the Gatorade High School Player of the Year in Virginia following his senior year. Jones continued his football career at the University of Virginia where he holds 15 UVa records and 10 ACC records. He was a consensus all-American in 1999, a Doak Walker Award finalist and was a first-team All-ACC running back as a junior and senior. Jones was the seventh overall pick in the 2000 NFL draft by the Arizona Cardinals. As a Chicago Bear in 2006, he gained over 1,000 yards rushing and in Super Bowl XLII he rushed for 123 yards against the Colts. He joined the New York Jets in 2007 and will be entering his eighth NFL season this fall.
For two years, few players in VHSL history dominated two sports like Talford did during his junior and senior years in track and basketball at Castlewood High School. In basketball, he was named Hogoheegee District Player of the Year, first-team All- Region C, first-team Group A allstate and Russell County and Southwest Virginia Player of the Year. He recorded 1,657 career points, including a single-game high of 59 points. In track, he owned the Group A state jumping events winning six individual championships in the long jump, triple jump and high jump. He established Group A state records in each event that are still the standards today. Talford also earned secondteam Group A all-state honors in football as a senior and all-region honors in baseball. He was named the 1988 Roanoke Times Male Athlete of the Year following his senior year. He continued his basketball career at East Tennessee State University earning four letters and winning the 1992 NCAA Slam Dunk contest before playing pro basketball in Europe. He currently resides in Johnson City, Tenn.
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