(Photo from University of Illinois.)
Longtime Fighting Illini basketball coach Lou Henson passed away Saturday at his home in Champaign at age 88.
Henson coached the Illini from 1975 until 1996. He led the Illini to the Final Four in 1989 and an Elite Eight and Big Ten title season in 1984. Henson’s Illini squads made it to the NCAA Tournament 12 times. The Illini also finished third in the 1980 NIT Tournament.
A native of Oklahoma and a graduate of New Mexico State University, Henson coached at Hardin-Simmons College in Texas and at his alma mater before moving to Champaign-Urbana in 1975 to coach the Illini.
Henson came out of retirement after one year to coach a second stint at New Mexico State until 2005.
Longtime Commercial-News sportswriter and WDAN announcer Fowler Connell, who covered Henson’s entire career at Illinois, remembers him this way.
“He visited Danville at times and we went out to dinner, way back when,” Connell said. “He was always very gracious at his home (and he) and his wife, they were very great people. He was a wonderful coach and was always accessible, which is something, sometimes, is hard to come by when you’re talking to coaches. He was one of the best in that regard, and he was true blue Illini.”
Henson has been inducted into the College Basketball Hall of Fame and the Fighting Illini Hall of Fame. In 2016, the court at State Farm Center was named “Lou Henson Court” in his honor.
