Jackie Gilloon dead.
- Thread starter Kbee3
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Point guard as I recall. Pretty slick ball handler and had good size but agree he was no Pistol Pete. When he played at South Carolina I think they had one of those softer surface courts.
Saw Jackie Gilloon at the Dapper Dan Classic in Pittsburgh. A skinny kid who was all elbows and kneecaps and an excellent point guard. BTW, does anyone remember another South Carolina star from Notre Dame HS in Lawrence Twp., Skip Harlicka?
Lots of great players in Hudson County in the 70s.
Boylan, O'Koren, Spanarkel. I'm sure I'm missing a few.
Boylan, O'Koren, Spanarkel. I'm sure I'm missing a few.
Flashy, tremendous player. Had a great handle. Unbelievable passer. He had a game developed in the schoolyard, not summer camps and personal trainers and shooting coaches.
You forgot our own Daryl Strickland with whom I roomed with on many road trips.
Best of Luck,
Groz
I’m sure Rutgers was an afterthought for Jackie (or maybe his academics excluded Rutgers admission at the time). He wanted to get away. Playing for Rutgers or Seton Hall or Saint John’s might have been the best for him. His background in some ways parallels that of Chris Mullin, who did stick around and succeeded in a big way.
And got to play for a famous and accomplished coach who had established a NY area pipeline for players.
I went to North Bergen High between 1971-1975 . We played Memorial HS 2 times a year and he was way ahead of his time. His passes would hit the forwards and centers on the head. He was unstoppable with the ball in his hands with every behind the back move into a jump shot there was. He had Pistol Pete’s handle but not his spectacular shooting touch. He was magical to watch. His grades affected where he went then onto South Carolina where again he was too fast for his teammates. He would be great in today’s NBA .
Also saw Spanarkel and O’Koren beat a St. Anthony’s team in the Hudson County Final in 1970-71 where they each put up 20 points before they went on to Duke and Carolina. Hudson County with the Jersey City teams was high level basketball in the 70’s.
Later on , Danny Callandrillo went to North Bergen and his team beat Camden for the Group Final . Danny was a friend and was 4 years younger but ran into him in 1982 in Albany when he was playing for the Albany Patroons in the CBA and Phil Jackson was the coach. Danny was another killer of a player. Had a great career at Seton Hall.
As we get older , we can just look back at marvel at the talent.
RIP to Jackie Gilloon and prayers to his family. Special talent
I Ioved that Hudson Catholic team with Spanarkel, O'Koren, and Jim McDonough.
That was my favorite NJ high school team until I saw North Bergen host Bob Hurley's St. Anthony's awesome unit. Bobby Hurley, Terry Dehere, Rhodrick Rhodes, Jerry Walker, and I think the fifth guy was Sean Rooney.
Best New Jersey high school team I've ever seen....easily.
BTW, my wife is a North Bergen grad....1969.
The Weequahic HS teams 1995-1996 and 1966-1967 were NJ's best ever high school teams. All 5 starters played major college hoops, 2 made the NBA.
Sorry, I never saw either of those Weequahic teams.
The St. Anthony's team the year I'm talking about beat you at coach too.
Walker, Hurley, Dehere, Rhodes. (Bobby...Dan was out for the season with an injury). Played so well together.
Walker rebounding, passing to Jr. on the break....a thing of beauty.
I saw Essex Catholic beat that Hudson Catholic team by 30 in a regular season game in Newark.
EC later on lost in County Final to unbeaten East Orange by 3 for their only loss of the season up at Seton Hall in what was the best HS game I ever saw . Essex later on went through Parochial A fairly easily in the State Tourney.
I think they let about 4000 into that game up at Seton Hall. It was crazy.
I was very good friends with John McDermott and played plenty of games with John on the courts of Hazlet. I was at the Raritan HS home game against Memorial when McDermott outscored Gilloon 44-40 in Raritan's upset win. I believe it was something like 70-68.https://archive.centraljersey.com/2012/05/03/mcdermott-recalls-his-battles-with-addictions/
There’s a blast from the past. John was 2 or 3 years older than me but I was in his brother Mike’s class at Raritan. Used to watch John play at Leucadia court and caught him in a few home games at Raritan. He was a wizard with the ball. Fairly short - couldn’t have been more than 5’9 or so, and probably less. Someone told me when he was in elementary school they used to let him do dribbling exhibitions at halftime of the high school games.
Thats correct. Other great HS players down the Shore in the 70s.
Kelvin Troy
Alex Bradley
Flip Williams
Bob Roma
Paterno and Roma were CBA team mates that beat Hudson Catholic in the state finals. (I think)
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Yup, Leocadia Court had some great talent play there on Friday and Saturday nights, from all the surrounding towns. Johns sister had a really good son that I coached in basketball and baseball in HYAL and travel teams. In later years, before my working in the $hitshow for 30 years,{USPS}, I'd stop and talk to John when I'd fix copiers and he was a janitor at Cove Road School in Hazlet.