Fran O’Hanlon, longtime Daily News writers highlight latest Big 5 Hall of Fame class
Fran O'Hanlon, who made his mark at three of the schools in the City Series, highlights a Big 5 Hall of Fame class that will be inducted during the inaugural Big 5 Classic at the Wells Fargo Center.
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The inaugural Big 5 Classic tripleheader Dec. 2 at the Wells Fargo Center will not only celebrate the new Big 5 of the present and future, it also will honor its past.
The Big 5, now made up of six teams, announced its latest Hall of Fame inductees Thursday, and the seven members of the 2023 class will be inducted during the Dec. 2 event.
The class features four former players in Dionne Anthon of Penn, DeAndre’ Bembry of St. Joseph’s, Tyreek Duren of La Salle, and Villanova’s Fran O’Hanlon. Joining the former Big 5 athletes in the class are two media members — longtime Daily News college hoops writers Mike Kern and Dick Jerardi — and a communications pro in Larry Dougherty, who retired this year after 20 years at Temple, having served as the school’s sports information director following a 15-year stint in athletic communications at St. Joe’s.
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O’Hanlon has spent more time around the game — in Philadelphia and beyond — than the other inductees, both a comment on his age (75) and the fact that he’s still on the Philadelphia basketball scene. The Philadelphia native and St. Thomas More grad played three varsity seasons at Villanova as a point guard before a professional career in Sweden. He began his head coaching career in Israel in 1983 and came home to assist on the Temple women’s staff in 1984 before becoming the head coach at Monsignor Bonner. O’Hanlon was on Fran Dunphy’s staff at Penn from 1989-95 before taking over the head coaching job at Lafayette, where he retired in 2022.
Retirement didn’t last long. O’Hanlon is back to his roots, now coaching at Cardinal O’Hara in the Philadelphia Catholic League.
Bembry and Duren recently helped their respective schools reach the NCAA Tournament, twice in Bembry’s case. The Hawks won two Atlantic 10 titles with Bembry, who was both league and Big 5 player of the year in 2016. Duren, who played at Neumann Goretti in high school, is La Salle’s all-time co-leader in games played (132).
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Anthon, a Penn Athletics Hall of Fame inductee in 2010, is eighth on Penn’s all-time scoring list. She graduated Penn as an undergrad in 1992 before returning to receive a law degree in 2005.
Kern and Jerardi combined for nearly 75 years of experience covering college basketball in Philadelphia for the Daily News and covered and wrote columns on Big 5 greats like John Chaney, Jay Wright, Phil Martelli, and many more. Jerardi once was president of the U.S. Basketball Writers Association and was inducted into that organization’s Hall of Fame in 2014. Kern, a former president of the Philadelphia Sports Writers Association, was named the state’s best sportswriter in 2003.