This is the seventh installment in The Gazette’s summer “Where Are They Now?” series. Each week for the rest of this summer, The Gazette will catch up with a prominent former Emporia-area athlete.
As Alan Robinson enjoyed a decorated Emporia High basketball career that culminated with All-State and high school All-American honors, the EHS teams he played on didn’t win much. But in at least one way, the Spartans of the early- to mid-’60s were ahead of their time.
“Because, I mean, we were kind of an oddball team, because we were kind of a run-and-gun team,” he said. “But back then, most teams were pretty conservative. They had more of a slowed-down offense: work the ball in and make sure you get either a layup or a close-in shot. And that’s not true anymore. They’re firing it up from everywhere.”
Robinson, who graduated from EHS in 1964, now lives in Aubrey, Texas, about an hour north of Dallas. He’s working in commercial real estate as a landlord, helping out a friend who purchased a building about a year ago — which represented a professional shift for Robinson after he spent about 25 years distributing wire and cable for the communications industry.
The real estate game, as he’s seen firsthand, isn’t a great business to be in right now. But Robinson says Cripple Creek Development, his friend’s business, hasn’t been hit too hard by the economic and real estate downturn.
“As soon as we closed on the building, things started going south,” Robinson said, laughing. “So I’m going, ‘This is not good karma, you know?’... But the whole nation’s feeling this, not just us.”
A 6-foot-3 forward, Robinson did most of his scoring from the outside, racking up 1,190 points. Perhaps his most memorable performance was a 52-point game against Abilene his junior year. Though basketball was the only sport in which he earned honors, Robinson was also on the football, baseball and track and field teams.
“It was as much fun as athletics can be,” he said. “I really enjoyed playing there.”
He wishes the 3-point line had been in existence back then, and not just because of his own skill set as a player. Under coach Marvin Stiver, Emporia was an uptempo, fast-breaking team, but spent much of its time shooting from the outside. Competing against a number of bigger schools, the Spartans had losing records during each of Robinson’s three years on varsity. Depth was an issue on those teams, but Robinson said that with a 3-point line, Emporia might have performed better.
“I felt like our starting five was a good starting five,” Robinson said. “It’s just that, to keep up with those bigger schools — they had more depth than we did. They could pretty much wear us down, and they did a good job of it.”
Robinson made All-State his senior year and earned a high school All-American honor from Royal Crown Cola. He went to Kansas State on a basketball scholarship, but during his season on the freshman team, he suffered a knee injury, had surgery and spent most of the second half of the season on the bench.
He transferred to Emporia State as a sophomore and, after sitting out the first semester, sustained another knee injury and had another surgery. He decided to give up competitive basketball.
“It sucked,” Robinson said. “But it kept me out of Vietnam, so I guess that’s not all bad.”
When his parents moved to Wichita, Robinson followed them there and ended up getting his degree from Friends University.
He lived in Plano, Texas, from 1977 until 2004, when he moved to Aubrey. He and his wife, Cindy, have a 10-year-old son named Matthew, and he has two grown children, a son named Kelly and a daughter named Keri, from a previous marriage. He still has an uncle, two aunts and some cousins who live in the Emporia area but rarely gets back; the last time he visited was about three years ago. Most of his basketball-watching time these days is spent keeping up with the Dallas Mavericks or the Texas Longhorns.
Though he laughingly says he “wishes I wasn’t” in the real estate business, Robinson is staying optimistic that the market will turn around before too long.
“We’ve taken a couple of hits, but nothing like some of the people here,” he said. “Some of these buildings or strip malls or whatever are becoming almost vacated. So it’s not as bad as it could be. At least we still have renters.”
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
i played basketball with allan robinson and i remember one game he made a shot that covered three quarters of the court. he was just tremendous you just had to be there to appreciate what i am trying to say. when i was a senior allan was a sophmore and i remember the coach benching me almost the whole game against topeka for my harlam globetrotter dribbling antics in the previous game. with just about a minute left in the game coach look at me and said reddog win one for the spartans. i took the inbound pass and went the length of the court and caught a player naping and scored. with just seconds on the clock we were only one point behind. we put on a full court press and robbie as we used to call him took the ball away from topeka and tossed it to reddog for the spartan victory. william shakepeare said, praising what is lost makes the remembrance dear. i think the reason we were given a memory is that we might have roses in december. i think it would be nice to retire his number at the w l white auditorium.
August 1, 2009 at 3:21 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
admireed (anonymous) says...
I well remember Allan nailing shots from the corner time and time again. A game vs Manhattan stands out. Threes many of them were/would be.
August 1, 2009 at 6:08 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
alan robinson was also an accomplished baseball player. i remember in the little leagues and sandlot games at the robinson ball field on the southeast corner of 5th and sherman street, alan was a standout. most kids did not want to bat against him for fear that if they got hit in the head, they knew it would kill them. iplayed with alan on the 1962 american legion baseball team that came within a whisker of wining the first state championship for emporia. we had it in the bag but the zipper broke. we had two outs in the last inning and a three run lead. a ball was hit to third but the throw to first was just a little off the mark and lawrence went on to win the game and the championship. mike pitko and reddog were named to the state all star team. pitko went on to play professional baseball for the dodger organization and sam wiley would have signed with the st louis cardinals but a knee injury brought his playing days to an end. what juiced our team up was area players like steve inwood from ople, gary gibb from americus, price speece from reading and a great sidearm pitcher from hartford named jim zigler.
August 1, 2009 at 9:29 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
alan robinson was a super track star who came close to breaking a school record but, i can not remember the event. i do remember that there was a cross eyed discuss player on our team, he did not set any records but, he kept the crowd alert.
August 2, 2009 at 12:08 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
my senior year i do not remember allan coming out for football. reddog was captain of the team but we were terrible. as a matter of fact i think allan robinson jerry thomas and steve sauder played on the emporia high team that broke a 5 year losing streak and they let school to celabrate the victory. reddog was ever so happy. reddog was known as a fearless spear tackler which has been outlawed to prevent casualties. reddog has an emporia high school record as the only defensive halfback to intercept two passes within the 15 yard line in the same game. reddog went on to play for the college of emporia fighting presbees who were ranked number 3 in small college football. we went to the final four and our coach was named the knute rockne coach of the year. this just goes to show you that difficulities can stimulate you to your greatest achievments.
August 2, 2009 at 1:28 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
as i recall alan was a darn good bowler. we used to bowl at the judsons bowling alley above a building next door south at moon abstract at 421 commercial. now this was one sport he could not even come close to me. i won the 1959 junior christmas tournament, emporia city championship, emporia masters championship and i even won a roll off to challenge judy ashely a professional bowler from kansas city. you might say i was a step ahead of bobby riggs, anyhow i was defeated by 1 pin, but it was fun.
August 2, 2009 at 1:55 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
alan i wish you the best in commercial real estate. i heard the other day about a real estate agent that had a hard time finding a two story home that he was to list. finally he knocked on the door and ask if he was at the right address. the seller said yes, and the agent said, i thought you said it was two story and the seller replied, heck yes it is, one story when i bought it and another story when i moved in.
August 2, 2009 at 2:17 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
alan if you ever come back to emporia, maybe we can play around of golf. i must tell you a story, about 3 years ago my father and me were playing our weekly match and we met up with a couple of guys on about the next to the last hole and they asked us to join in and we did. on my third shot i was laying about 40 feet of the green and i told everyone, this is going to be a babe ruth shot and much to my amazement i holed it out. then my dad said, son i think i can do that also and he did. for a couple of weekend golfers, the odds of this happening is like being on a honey moon with jane fonda and being struck by lightning.
August 2, 2009 at 2:50 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
reddog (K. B. Thomas Jr.) says...
alan i got one more story to tell you and then i got to get to bed so i can go to church tomorrow. a couple years ago i was playing golf with a local chiropractor and guess what he made a hole in one. the next day i put this notice in the paper. the bold headline read hole in one and then i said, local chiropractor makes adjustment to golf swing and aces number11. his playing partner reddog said, it was such a beautiful shot that when doc put the needle in, it didnt even hurt.
August 2, 2009 at 3:07 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )