Rockford’s greatest basketball team just lost its most unsung star, a player who tried to turn down the spotlight in his best chance to be the star.
Bobby Washington, who died last week at age 87, scored a career-high 17 points, including three straight free throws in the final 21 seconds, to help Rockford’s West High win its second straight IHSA state title with a 67-65 win over Edwardsville in 1956.
“Bobby was the difference tonight,” hall of fame coach Alex Saudargas told the Rockford Register-Republic after the game. “He really came through.”
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Washington didn’t see it that way.
When asked by Register-Republic sports editor Jim Johnston what it felt like to be the hero, Washington responded: “No, no. no. We all did it.”
"Robert," said his wife of 50 years, Tamarra Washington, "was low-key. Robert would never solely take the credit for any accomplishment the team had. Or even individual accomplishments. He always downplayed those."
And of the pressure on those free throws? “Well,” he said at the time, “it sort of scares you if you stop to think about it, so I just didn’t think.”
Almost 70 years later, Rockford people still think of those great West teams. Just as a rival predicted. East coach Art Sadtler told the Register-Republic at the time: “This team is one in a million. It will be a long time before we see another like it, in Rockford or anywhere else.”
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Those West teams were led by 6-foot-7 frontcourt players Nolden Gentry, a high school All-American, and John Wessels. Both players were named to this newspaper's list of 10 greatest basketball players in Rockford history and both went on to start in the Big Ten for Iowa and Illinois, respectively. Washington, who backed up Rex Parker on the 1955 team and was the starting point guard in 1956, also made it to the Big Ten. He averaged 5.8 points and 2.7 rebounds in 58 games over three seasons as Gentry’s teammate at Iowa.
Parker and Gentry both attended Washington's funeral last weekend.
“He was a good defensive man and he also could score,” Parker said. “He was an outstanding athlete.”
Washington was a star three-sport athlete at West, also starting at quarterback for the football team and was the top pitcher on the Warriors’ baseball team. He remained athletic his whole life, whether it was playing golf, pool or table tennis, or simply keeping in shape.
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"Robert was an avid golfe," his widow said. "This time last year we would have been planning which golf course we were going to play. At 87, he wasn't playing basketball, but he was doing a lot of golfing and he was working out three days a week with a friend he had coached community college basketball with. He was also working out two days a week at our hospital wellness center. He was trying to keep his body taken care of."
Those West teams both finished 28-1 and at the time were only the third team in Illinois history to win consecutive state titles. The second title helped Rockford pass Mount Vernon and become the first city to win five state high school basketball titles. Rockford High School won in 1911, 1919 and 1939 when it was the only public school in town. West High, which opened in 1940, closed after the 1989 school year and was converted into a middle school.
Washington lived in Burlington, Iowa, his wife's home town, for the entire 50 years of their marriage. Tamarra never saw Bobby play basketball for either West High or Iowa, but she and their two kids know the stories well. West High's feats live on — even before a book came out about the team in 2017.
"Our son remembers hearing the stories when we would visit Rockford or visit with his former teammates," his wife said. "It came up often. They had a book signing before they sold off the rights to the book. The people waiting to have their books signed had stories they were passing up and down the line.
"The stories always came up. They were just good times."
Matt Trowbridge is a Rockford Register Star sports reporter. Email him at mtrowbridge@rrstar.com. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, at @MattTrowbridge.
This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: One of the stars of Rockford West High's back-to-back state basketball champions dies
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