Exciting events shape career with two wrestlers in big role

When you hang around high school sports as long as I have, the ratings game becomes part of many conversations.

Inquiring minds often want to know how I rate the athletes, teams, coaches and games I have seen in almost 50 years on the job.

Retired Sun-Times sports writer Taylor Bell is working on a book about the history of high school football in Illinois. Bell asked for some of my observations on the people and events that have shaped our area's football history.

What were the most memorable games?

Who were the best players?

What coaches had the most impact?

I tried to come up with the answers, but it's difficult. Covering high school sports becomes a big blur over 50 years. So many names, games.

When Bell's book comes out in about a year, I can almost guarantee I'll kick myself for missing something or someone very significant in our football history.

However, Bell's questions did make me stop and think about all the events, boys and girls, I have watched in 50 years at this newspaper, and not just high-profile football and basketball.

Many of the most vivid memories for some sports come from my early years on the job because I personally covered everything. The area and Daily Herald sports staff were much smaller, and this paper was a weekly covering only local events.

On this weekend of the 2008 IHSA state wrestling tournament, let's flash back to March 3, 1962.

I was in my fourth year with the Herald and covering the state wrestling tourney at Arlington High School.

A capacity crowd of almost 5,000 fans packed the gymnasium (and violated some fire laws) for the finals of the IHSA event. The place was rocking.

I enjoyed all the matches and was busy taking notes for my stories, but like many other people there that night, I really was waiting for the finale -- the big boys squaring off, the heavyweights.

I had never been to a heavyweight title fight in boxing, but I had the feeling that night that this was a high school version of Dempsey vs. Tunney, Louis vs. Conn.

When Bob Billberg of Waukegan and Bob Pickens of Evanston walked out of the locker room to center stage in the Arlington gym on that March night in 1962, the place went up for grabs.

I'll never forget the scene.

Pickens was the defending heavyweight champion, but Billberg already had 3 wins over him in the 1961-62 season. They were great battles.

Pickens had defeated Billberg 4-3 in the sectional semifinals the previous season to keep him from state.

It's difficult to beat somebody three times in one season, particularly a defending state champion. Four is an enormous challenge.

The wrestlers bounced on their toes, slapping their legs and heads while coaches gave them final reminders.

Two young men walked slowly to the mat to the thunderous applause of foot-stomping fans. Everybody was standing.

Anyone in the stands who shouted instructions to the wrestlers seemed well-versed in the nuances of the sport.

"Move him!" "Work him!" "Break him down!"

I would like to report this was a sensational heavyweight title match, but the action paled in comparison to all the hype.

Billberg beat Pickens for the fourth time 3-0.

However, the buildup made this one of the most memorable high school events I have ever watched.

Billberg won two national titles in four years at Moorhead State College in Minnesota.

He was Libertyville's head wrestling coach from 1973-87, retired because of health complications with diabetes and died at 60 in an automobile accident in 2004. He was driving home from Moorhead after he and his wrestling teammates had been inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.

In addition to his wrestling resume at Evanston, Pickens was an all-state tackle in football and a shot put and discus standout in track and field.

He placed sixth in the world in Greco-Roman wrestling in 1965, and after starting at the University of Wisconsin, he transferred to Nebraska where he starred in football and AAU wrestling.

Pickens, who became a Chicago Park District Commissioner with a successful business background, played with the Bears and in the Canadian Football League and served as a Big Ten football official.

Billberg vs. Pickens.

I can remember the buildup like it was yesterday.

The anticipation for that high school event is something I will never forget.

Who needs professional sports?

I knew at that moment in 1962 I had picked the right career.

If this was what high school sports were all about, I was headed for an exciting ride.

That ride continues in 2008.