North Carolina State University Athletics
PEELER: Burden Elected to NC Sports Hall of Fame
1/20/2009 12:00:00 AM | Football
BY TIM PEELER
RALEIGH, N.C. Former NC State running back Willie Burden, the 1973 ACC Football Player of the Year who led the Wolfpack to the ACC Championship that season, has been named to the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame.
Burden, a native of Raleigh and one of NC State’s first African-American football recruits, joins five other inductees in the 2009 NCSHOF class, which will be enshrined at the 46th-annual induction banquet on May 14 in the main ballroom of the North Raleigh Hilton.
Another member of the class, golf professional and course developer Roger Watson, also has ties to NC State. His management company, Carolinas Golf Group, will manage and maintain the Lonnie Poole Golf Course on Centennial Campus when it opens in the spring. His son, Chip, is the general manager of the LPGC and an assistant coach for the NC State men’s golf program.
The other inductees include ACC Commissioner John Swofford of North Wilkesboro, Appalachian State football coach Jerry Moore of Boone, North Carolina women’s basketball coach Sylvia Hatchell of Chapel Hill and Goldsboro-native Dave Odom, the former head basketball coach at Wake Forest and South Carolina.
Burden earned all-state honors as a running back at Raleigh’s Enloe High School. As a senior at State in 1973, he became the school’s first 1,000-yard rusher. He still ranks in the school’s top 10 career rushers with 2,529 yards and 22 career touchdowns.
Following his college career, he spent eight years in the Canadian Football League. In 1992, his No. 10 jersey was added to the Calgary Stampeders Wall of Fame and in 2001 he was inducted into the CFL Hall of Fame.
While playing professionally, Burden returned to Raleigh during the summers to work for the NC State athletics department.
“[Former athletics director] Willis Casey was a very good friend and sort of took me under his wing when I was in the CFL,” Burden said in a 2006 interview. “He gave me the opportunity to work in the athletics department for eight years, the entire time I was in the CFL.
“I coached for a couple of years, I was in fund-raising for a couple of years, I worked in ticketing. He just spread me around so I could learn the business. He said when you are done playing, the first thing you need to do is get your masters degree if you are going to get in this business.”
When his professional career ended, Burden served as the athletics director at NC A&T in Greensboro from 1990-1999. He is presently an associate professor in sports management Georgia Southern in Statesboro, Ga.
He received his bachelor’s degree in Economics from NC State in 1974, his masters degree from Ohio University in 1984 and his doctorate in education from Tennessee State in 1990.
He is the 35th former NC State player, coach, staff or alumni to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
You may contact Tim Peeler at tim_peeler@ncsu.edu.
N.C. State’s members of the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame
(Year inducted in parenthesis)
Everett Case, basketball (1964)
Jack McDowall, football (1965)
Bones McKinney, basketball (1970)
Roman Gabriel, football (1971)
Earle Edwards, football (1974)
Vic Bubas, basketball (1975)
Ron Shavlik, basketball (1979)
Sam Ranzino, basketball (1981)
David Thompson, basketball (1982)
Willis Casey, administrator/swimming (1985)
Roger Craig, baseball (1985)
Kay Yow, basketball (1989)
Lou Pucillo, basketball (1991)
Julie Shea Graw, track (1993)
Steve Rerych, swimming (1993)
Norman Sloan, basketball (1994)
Ted Brown, football (1995)
Jim Valvano, basketball (1995)
Tommy Burleson, basketball (1996)
Jim Mills, baseball (1997)
Mike Caldwell, baseball (1998)
Vic Sorrell, baseball (1999)
Jim Ritcher, Football (1999)
Connie Mack Berry, football, baseball, basketball (2000)
Vic Molodet, basketball (2001)
Page Marsh, golf (2001)
Betty Springs Geiger, track/cross country (2003)
Carey Brewbaker, football (2004)
Peter Fogarassy, swimming (2005)
Charlie Bryant, basketball/administration (2006)
Bob Harris (2006)
Genia Beasley, women's basketball (2007)
Dennis Byrd, football (2007)
Claude Gibson (2007)
Willie Burden (2009)
