KALAMAZOO, Mich. – The Western Michigan Division of Intercollegiate Athletics will induct the 2016 Hall of Fame class on Friday, Sept. 23, at the Fetzer Center and this week www.wmubroncos.com will take a look at each of our inductees: Kenny Cunningham (men's basketball), Jeff Kraft (men's gymnastics), Pat Locanto (baseball), Shannon Pickell (women's basketball/track & field) and Zakiya Pope (volleyball).
KENNY CUNNINGHAM
Kenny Cunningham transferred to Western Michigan to play basketball with two years of eligibility left in 1978. In those two seasons he torched the Mid-American Conference, amassing 1,207 points. His two-year point total remains the 15th-highest in program history. Cunningham was named Second Team All-MAC during the 1978-79 season and garnered First Team All-MAC honor in 1979-80. During the 1979-80 season he led the MAC with 24.2 points per game, the third highest single season average in program history. He was later drafted by the Utah Jazz in 1980. After basketball Cunningham returned to his hometown of Toledo, Ohio, and started an employment agency. He is now the President and Chief Executive Officer of KenMours Marketing & Recruiting.
Q & A with Kenny Cunningham
Q: How did you learn that you were going into the Hall of Fame?
I got a call from Kathy Beauregard and she left me a message. I called her back and then she called me back to offer me her congratulations to me.
Q: What about your game allowed you to be such a prolific scorer?
Well, you know like they say you have confidence in your abilities. I was always a great shooter and was able to score at will. I was very confident that when I threw it up it would go in.
With my place in the record books all of that was done without the three-point line. After my time at Western Michigan I got a call from Steve Fisher, who used to coach as an assistant at Western Michigan before going on to be the head coach at Michigan. He called me and said, "Kenny Cunningham, you won't believe this. They just put the three-point line in," and I couldn't believe it. I was floored. So you could imagine that if I was at 24 points a game, knowing me, it could have been a lot higher if they had the three-point line in my days. So it tells you a lot that all of the new scoring records were done with the three-point line, but my marks are still very relevant.
Q: What are some memories that stand out from your time at Western Michigan?
I had a very good friend, Mark Aguirre. We played in an Olympic camp together in Colorado Springs with James Worthy. We were all roommates together. At that time DePaul, who Mark played for (and finished the 78-79 season ranked No. 6). They came to Western Michigan and I think I ended up with 38 points in that game and we beat them! It was a little bit of a shock to the nation that we beat them. Mark, being a very good friend, when he got to Western Michigan we got together and went out. It was funny because we were good friends and they came in our house thinking they would walk over us and we ended up beating them.
Another great memory was getting to play against Magic Johnson at home when he played at Michigan State.
Q: How did you come to be such a great success outside of basketball?
Well I first got drafted by Utah and then I got a chance to go to the Philadelphia 76ers camp and for a while I thought I was going to be a Sixer. They made some trades where Andrew Toney came in and then Lionel Hollins was traded for and it took my chances away. You had two 6-foot-5 guards coming in and this was the era where you saw the big guards start to appear. I was having some contract issues with Utah so I came back and did a lot of public speaking to a lot of the Universities and high schools around Toledo. I just became a guy who helped people get jobs and that's what led me to opening an employment agency and I've been doing that for about 26 years now.
