Gigi Marvin soon will be back on the ice looking to score more goals in 2024. Cheryl Reeve will be plotting another run at a WNBA ring, one for her thumb. Phil Housley will be urging his New York Rangers to stay near the top of the Eastern Conference from his associate head coach post.
Those three, still busy pursuing their goals in sports, also will be joining the Star Tribune Minnesota Sports Hall of Fame, along with five more greats from the state's sporting history.
The Star Tribune is announcing the Hall of Fame's class of 2023 today, and it has a "hockey and hoops" feel to it. Joining Reeve on the basketball side are:
• Tayler Hill, who set the Minnesota scoring record and won a state championship at Minneapolis South before going on to Ohio State and the WNBA. She scored 3,888 points in high school and made the All-Big Ten first team twice in college. She was the fourth overall pick in the 2013 WNBA draft.
• Willie Burton, who led the Gophers men's basketball team to the Sweet 16 in 1989 and Elite 8 in 1990. Burton's No. 34 has been retired by the Gophers; he finished as the program's No. 2 scorer, with 1,800 points. He made the All-Big Ten team three times, landing on the first team in 1990. He played eight seasons in the NBA, the first four in Miami after the Heat drafted him in the first round (ninth overall) in 1990.
• Larry McKenzie, already a member of the Minnesota Basketball Coaches Hall of Fame. McKenzie led Minneapolis Henry High School to four consecutive state titles before leaving for Minneapolis North, where he also won two championships, becoming the first coach to lead two schools to multiple titles. He coached 24 years, also spending time at Holy Angels, and went 481-166.
And joining Marvin and Housley from the hockey side:
• Henry Boucha enters the Hall of Fame posthumously. Boucha died Sept. 18 at age 72 after a storied career and a full life after hockey. Boucha was a high school legend from Warroad and later played in the Olympics (silver medal, 1972), NHL and WHA. He spent NHL time with the North Stars and played for the Minnesota Fighting Saints of the WHA. In high school, he fired up hockey fans when he led tiny Warroad to the state championship game in 1969, but the Warriors lost to Edina.