Schlossberg Gets Call Into Wheeling Hall
Longtime Daily Herald, Local Prep Sportswriter to be Inducted Friday with Girls Cross Country Pioneers
When Howard Schlossberg was covering Wheeling High School sports for the Wheeling Countryside Reminder News in the late 1970s he received a request from cross country and track coach Mark Saylor.
Saylor told Schlossberg he had to come to a season-ending banquet. Schlossberg was hesitant, primarily because he had work to wrap up for that week’s edition of the paper, but Saylor was insistent.
Schlossberg went with his mind still on the work he needed to do, when he was recognized and presented with a plaque in appreciation of the work he had done with his Wheeling coverage. He turned to Saylor and said “you got me” of the plaque he still has in his den.
“I can’t say enough nice things about Wheeling High School,” said Schlossberg, who covered high school sports for the Daily Herald from 1994 to 2020.
The feeling is mutual as Schlossberg will once again be honored by the school. He was chosen to be part of the Class of 2024 of the Wheeling Athletics Hall of Fame. The induction ceremony of Schlossberg and two groups of girls cross country pioneers will take place at approximately 7 p.m. Friday between the boys sophomore and varsity basketball games with Buffalo Grove. There will also be a reception and reunion at 5:30 p.m. in the staff lounge.
“This was a complete shock,” Schlossberg said of getting the news from Wheeling assistant principal Don Rowley Jr. “For me it’s a chance to see all the coaches and athletes I haven’t seen in 30 to 40 years. That’s the thrill of it, to shake hands with them and give them a hug.”
That will include fellow Wheeling Hall of Famers such as Donna Dubbelde and Saylor. Schlossberg said Dubbelde, who was one of the Mid-Suburban League’s girls sports pioneers and the school’s first head coach in basketball and volleyball, is throwing a party for him beforehand. Schlossberg, his wife Jocelyn and Saylor will all be coming in from their homes in Arizona.
“I can never say enough nice things about Mark and Jim Nagel,” Schlossberg said of the cross country and track coach who passed away in October. “Donna was a great coach and a very generous lady.”
Covering Wheeling didn’t figure to be in the plan since Schlossberg grew up in Brooklyn and went to college at Albany State in New York. Getting his masters’ degree at Northern Illinois University led to his first journalism job with the Reminder’s Barrington and Palatine papers.
When a paper started in Buffalo Grove and Wheeling he worked there full-time for seven years and part-time for 10 when he took a full-time job in the publishing industry. A couple of his fond memories are of Ted Ecker, the most successful boys basketball coach in school history, and Sandy Rainey, a star athlete who played with the Chicago Hustle in the Women’s Professional Basketball League (WBL).
“‘Geez Louise’ were the first words from Ted after a tough loss, every time,” Schlossberg laughed. “Sandy Rainey was such a vibrant athlete. She was one of the best female basketball players I saw, period.”
And Schlossberg always enjoyed covering the Wildcat Hardwood Classic, which Ecker started, “and seeing all the retired (District) 214 coaches come in (the hospitality room) and eat for free.”
Schlossberg would switch to education as he taught at Harper College for a year and went to Columbia College in Chicago in 1994, where he eventually became a full-time journalism professor. A couple of his most successful students are Graham Couch, who covers Michigan State as the lead sports columnist at the Lansing State Journal, and Rod Burks, who has covered sports for WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee since 2006.
Schlossberg is still at it and just finished his eighth year covering high school football for the Arizona Republic. A big reason is what he learned from watching longtime Daily Herald prep guru Bob Frisk, who is also part of the Wheeling Hall of Fame.
“The value of it and the life lessons of it, Bob was such a great mentor,” Schlossberg said. “He was just invaluable to me when I came on board at the Herald.”
There will be also be two groups of “Pioneers and Champions of Girls Cross Country” inducted that Schlossberg covered at Wheeling.
The first group was part of the inaugural 1975 team, the mythical state meet champion in 1976 and the unofficial second- and fourth-place teams in 1977 and 1978 respectively. The inductees include Janet Altman, Denise Begrowicz, Bonnie Buenzow Taylor, Donna Czaja, Diana Disano, Carolyn Ellis, Gail Miloch Huster, Kim Moran, Kathy Peter, Chris Rathje, Marilyn Snyder, Stephanie Stevens, Sue Timm, Marcia Warden, Michele Weissensee Jarchow and Ann West.
The second group is the 1979 team that won the first IHSA-sponsored girls state meet as it romped past Evanston 91-169 and was coached by Nagel and Saylor. Debbie Bifulco Paust, Betsy Buenzow Petrie, Karen Egge, Julie Hendrickson D’Argo, Mary Krueger, Margaret Madden Schinler, Theresa Picchietti Budmats, Debbie Rathje, Geri Sabal Egen, Kim Salpietro Zacharkiewicz, Christina Sanchez, Donna Stewart Grotthus, Janice Vogt, Sharon Vogt and Theresa Vogt set the foundation for three more state championship teams (1983-84, 1986), two runners-up (1981, 2001) and two fourth-place finishers (1993, 2003).
Congratulations to Howard! A great writer and a terrific person!
Congrats to my former co-worker at Cahners. Way to go Schlossy!