By Bruce Auld News Review Contributor– Lenora Lacy Barnes (1983) is Burrough’s only Olympian. She competed in the 1996 Atlanta Games as a thrower. Beating kidney cancer as a young adult, a testimony to her tenacity and resilience, she became a world-class athlete and earned a PhD in psychology from Claremont Graduate School. Jerome Davis (1995) was the four-time PAC 10 400m champion competing at USC. Jerome was the 1998 NCAA Division I 400m national champion and the 1999 PAC 10 Athlete of the Year. Jerome was inducted into the USC Hall of Fame in 2006.
Burroughs has competed in four leagues: Desert-Inyo, Golden, Desert Sky and Mojave River. Regardless of the league, for eight decades, the travel is much the same. Leave around noon, a 200-mile round trip with four hours on a yellow school bus without air conditioning and back to Burroughs around 10 pm. Basketball was Burrough’s first CIF-sanctioned sport and, over the decades, very successful. Coach Bill Moore was the head coach for decades. Coach Moore left Burroughs for the 1957-58 school year. Absent from Burroughs for just one year, maybe a scheduled sabbatical leave. Nonetheless, one-year head coach Jim Nau led the Burros, anchored by six foot-seven center and ASB President Jay Carty, to win the CIF state championship. After a standout career at Oregon State University, Jay was drafted by the NBA’s St. Louis Hawks and would have been the first Burro to go pro in any sport. Instead, Jay remained at OSU as a graduate assistant, then transferred to UCLA as a graduate assistant coaching Lew Alcinder (Kareem Abdul Jabbar). Jay was a 27-year-old rookie playing for the LA Lakers in 1967, the only Burro to play in the NBA. Jay would write motivational books with UCLA legend Coach John Wooden. Burroughs basketball would win its second CIF state championship in 1982 under head coach Larry Bird. From 1978 through 1989, Burrough’s basketball would be champions or co-champions of the Golden League.
Burrough’s football debuted in the 1946 season. Under head coach Harold Pierce, the Burros posted a 5-3 winning season. Harold Pierce would later be the superintendent of the China Lake Elementary School District. Pierce School was named in his honor. The 1948 football Homecoming would introduce the alma mater and the Kelly Award. The first Kelly Award recipient was Arthur Craddock. The 2023 recipient is Joseph Buchan. The 1956 Burros would win the Desert-Inyo League football title and, for the first time, compete in the CIF State Finals, falling to South Pasadena. Burroughs football might be described as a roller coaster ride, with rare highs, long levels and occasional lows. Legendary head coach Bruce Bernhardi said, “Burroughs always plays up.” Especially in pre-league, Burroughs would compete with upper-level teams, sometimes resulting in season-ending injuries, yet challenging athletes to up their game. For decades, Burrough’s league competition would consist of schools twice Burroughs’s enrollment. Then, when advancing to post-season play, the likely opponent is a private school advantaged by unrestricted player recruitment. Nonetheless, the Burros have competed in the CIF State football finals in 1956, 1974, 2005 and 2017, winning the 2005 CIF state finals 42-30 over the Palm Springs High School Indians. The Burros were coached by Jeff Steinberg, who was named the LA Rams 2023 High School Coach of the Year for his work at Beaumont High School.
Pete Pifer (1963) was the 1962 Kelly Award recipient. He was drafted by the NFL’s NY Giants in 1967 but apparently did not report to camp. Pete was inducted into the Oregon State University Hall of Fame in 1990 and the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame in 1991. Ted Bachman (1969) was the first Burro to play professional football. Ted played defensive back for the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and the Miami Dolphins. Brant Tunget (1975) played for the Seattle Seahawks, the NY Giants and the LA Rams. Steve Cordle (1977) was signed by the Seattle Seahawks in 1982. Mike Waters was drafted by the NY Jets and played running back for the Philadelphia Eagles and New Orleans Saints. Joseph Tuipala (1994) played linebacker for two seasons with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Demario Brown (1995) shattered all rushing records at Utah State University and was signed as a free agent by the Tennessee Titans.
Baseball was late in joining Burrough’s athletic line-up, debuting in the spring of 1951. Vic Vieweg (1952), Dave Martin (1960) and Mike Baker (1960) were offered minor league contracts, electing instead to go to college. Tom Mather (1965) and John Martin (1966) went to college first and were subsequently signed as free agents. They both played for the Johnson City, NY Yankees. Mather and Martin were the first and second Burros to go pro in any sport. Numerous Burros played in the minor leagues, most going on to coach baseball at the youth and high school level for decades. Dr. Joe Norris (1988) was drafted out of Bakersfield College by the Montreal Expos. Joe spent nine years pitching in the minor leagues. In 2003, Joe started his teaching and coaching career at South Carolina’s Sumpter High School. His teams would win three state baseball championships. Dr. Norris earned his doctorate in organizational leadership from the University of South Carolina.
On June 2, 2001, Burrough’s baseball suited up in Dodger Stadium. Just kids playing baseball together since 1994 as the Desert Dawgs, the Burros played the number one team in the Nation, Bishop Amat, coming up short of a CIF state title. Casey Groves (of Casey’s restaurant) was the first Burro to hit a double in Dodger Stadium. Just days later, John Martin’s sons, Burros Kevin and JD, signed contracts together on June 5, 2001, with the Cleveland Indians. On July 20, 2009, JD Martin was called up to MLB by the Washington Nationals, posting his first MLB win on August 9, 2009, with a 9-2 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Teaching first grade in 1972 at Ridgecrest Heights (later Faller) School, a formidable man in athletic attire entered my classroom. It was the legendary VT Lillywhite (San Francisco 49ers legend and BHS athletic director). “We need a swim coach, and you are going to do it.” Prior to 1970, Burroughs didn’t have a swimming program. New Burroughs principal John Cissne’s son was a swimmer. Enter Burrough’s swimming. I agreed to coach the 1973 season as a placeholder for Coach Lattig. Charlie Lattig (1967) would coach the men’s Burros to three consecutive CIF championships: 1994, 1995 and 1996. In 2003, under coach Greg Janson (1989), the lady Burros would win the CIF State Swimming championship.
A bit of Burroughs trivia: The Burroughs football stadium was ranked least hospitable in the high desert for decades. The light poles were on the field, a collision hazard and there were only two toilets in the stadium. A DoD grant paid eighty percent of the cost of relocating the stadium lights off the field into the grandstands and ample restrooms. Job well done, SSUSD.
