STAFF REPORTS
Former San Antonio Spurs forward Robert Horry will be the keynote speaker as the best athletes and teams from the year in Rio Grande Valley athletics are honored at the 2017 All-Valley Sports Awards Banquet on June 10 at Mario’s Banquet & Conference Center in Mission.
Horry won seven NBA Championships and earned the moniker “Big Shot Rob” for clutch performances during his 16-year NBA career that included stints with the Spurs, Houston Rockets, Phoenix Suns and Los Angeles Lakers.
The Banquet, hosted by RGVSports.com and AIM Media Texas in conjunction with the RGV Sports Hall of Fame, will see 33 awards presented to standout athletes, coaches and teams across all 12 UIL sports. The highly prestigious Tom Landry Award of Excellence will honor a student-athlete for outstanding achievements on and off the field.
The Monitor, Valley Morning Star, The Brownsville Herald, Mid-Valley Town Crier and RGV Sports Hall of Fame will vote to determine the winners in the sports categories. While The Monitor, the Star and the Herald have previously named their All-Area teams in certain sports, the All-Valley Sports Awards Banquet will recognize the very best across all three coverage areas.
The tremendous demand for tickets at last year’s banquet, which sold out weeks before the event, has necessitated a change of venue to Mario’s Banquet & Convention Center. The new venue has a seating capacity of more than 500 people.
Tickets for the catered banquet, which will run 6 to 8 p.m., will be available soon at a cost of $40 per person. Sponsorship opportunities are still available. For more information, contact Marcia Kitten at 956-683-4463.
Horry averaged 7.0 points and 4.8 rebounds per game across 1,107 career appearances but became known much more for his clutch shots than his raw numbers. He started building that reputation in 1995, when in Game 1 of the Western Conference Finals he hit a jumper with 6.5 seconds remaining to give Houston a win over San Antonio. Horry also hit final-minute shots to secure NBA Finals game wins in 1995 and 2001. Then, with the Lakers in 2002, he connected on game-winning 3-pointers in Game 3 of a first-round playoff series and Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals.
Perhaps the most outstanding performance of Horry’s career came with the Spurs in 2005. During Game 5 of the NBA Finals, Horry scored 21 points in the fourth quarter and overtime, capped by a 3 with 5.8 seconds remaining, to give the Spurs a 96-95 win. He also made a critical shot to secure Game 4 of a first-round playoff game for the Spurs in 2007.
He won NBA titles in 1994, 1995, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2005 and 2007 after being selected by Houston with the 11th overall pick in the 1992 NBA Draft following a four-year career at the University of Alabama.
Since playing his final season in 2007-08, Horry has become a successful motivational speaker.