Meyers-Drysdale to Be Honored : Honor: All-American who led Sonora girls’ basketball team to 80-5 record to be inducted into high school hall of fame.
Anne Meyers-Drysdale, who brought national attention to women’s basketball in the 1970s, is among five former high school athletes selected for induction into the 1995 class of the National High School Sports Hall of Fame.
Meyers-Drysdale earned varsity letters in seven sports (field hockey, badminton, tennis, softball, volleyball, track and field and basketball) and graduated from Sonora High in 1974. In four years, she led Raider basketball teams to an 80-5 record while averaging 20 points, nine rebounds, eight assists and five steals.
She became the first high school player to make the U.S. national team and was a member of the 1976 U.S. Olympic women’s basketball team that won a silver medal.
Included among her “firsts,†Meyers-Drysdale was the first woman to receive a full athletic scholarship to UCLA, where she was a four-time All-American. She averaged 17.4 points during her Bruin career and was the first person to have a jersey retired at the school. She was awarded the Broderick Cup in 1978 as the top collegiate female athlete.
Meyers-Drysdale was also the first woman to sign an NBA contract when she joined the Indiana Pacers as a free agent before the 1979 season. She was the MVP during her only year (1980) in the defunct Women’s Basketball League.
Meyers-Drysdale has been inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., the Women’s Sports Hall of Fame, the Orange County Sports Hall of Fame, the Cincinnati Sports Hall of Fame, the UCLA Sports Hall of Fame and the California High School Sports Hall of Fame.
She and her late husband, former Dodger pitcher Don Drysdale, are the only husband-wife team in professional sports halls of fame.
Meyers-Drysdale is a sports broadcaster and conducts basketball camps and clinics.
The 1995 class is the 13th group to be inducted into the National High School Sports Hall of Fame, which was started in 1982 and is located in Kansas City, Mo.
Two others from California--Pat Haden and Herb Meyer--will join Meyers-Drysdale among the 14 individuals at induction ceremonies, July 5, in Portland, Ore.
Haden was a standout quarterback at La Puente Bishop Amat, USC and for seven years on the professional level--six with the Rams. He is currently a sports broadcaster, a general partner in a venture capital firm and is associated with a Los Angeles law firm.
Meyer has been a high school football coach for the last 36 years--17 at Oceanside and the past 19 at El Camino. His overall record of 275-108-13 is the best in the history of San Diego County and the second all-time in state history.
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