ODU Senior Executive Writer Harry Minium Jr. To Be Inducted Into Virginia Sports Hall of Fame

NORFOLK, Va. – Harry Minium Jr., senior executive writer for Old Dominion athletics whose history with ODU dates back more than 50 years, will be inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame, said Will Driscoll, the hall of fame’s executive director.

Located in Virginia Beach, the Hall of Fame has inducted 363 members since 1972. Minium will be the 20^th with strong ties to ODU.

Minium, 71, will be part of an eight-person class to be added on April 25-26 at the Westin Hotel in Town Center. Minium will be added as a sports journalist.

 “Over the past 40+ years, there are few who have contributed more to sports journalism in Virginia than Harry Minium,” Driscoll said.

“Throughout the entire (selection) process, letters of support from the likes of Frank Beamer, Kenny Easley, Dave Twardzik, and Dr. Wood Selig, among others, highlighted the respect he has earned through not only doing his job well, but doing it the right way.

“We’re thrilled to have him as part of the Hall’s Class of 2025.”

A Norfolk native, Minium is a 1977 ODU graduate and was a Monarch basketball fan in the 1960s and 1970s. He watched the ODU men’s basketball team win a Division II national championship as a fan in 1975.

Then, 10 years later, he covered ODU’s victory over Georgia in the 1985 NCAA women’s basketball national championship game as a reporter for The Virginian-Pilot.

The Miniums have been an ODU family. His late mother, Sadie W. Minium, graduated from ODU and his daughters, Amy and Ginny, also attended ODU as did two of his brothers, Mike and Tim.  

Minium was hired as a high school sports writer by the Richmond News Leader in 1978. He moved to Norfolk a year later to work at The Virginian-Pilot and stayed for 39 years. He later earned a Master’s degree in mass communications from VCU.

Minium covered a myriad of sports teams with the Pilot, from high schools, Norfolk State, Virginia and Virginia Tech football and basketball to the Norfolk Admirals. In 2012, he was assigned to cover ODU football for the Pilot and has covered the Monarchs for either the newspaper or the university for the last 13 seasons.  

Minium left the Pilot to come came to ODU in 2018. He covers all 18 ODU athletic teams for the University’s athletics web page, www.odusports.com

Minium won nearly 30 writing awards from the Virginia Press Association, the Associated Press and the Football and Basketball Writers of America and the Society for Features Journalism while at the Pilot. He has won four writing awards in his six 1/2 years at ODU, including two from the College Sports Information Directors of America.

Minium was a second-team All-Eastern Region football linebacker and team captain at Norview High School where he also wrestled, played baseball and ran track.

At ODU, he worked for three years at the Mace and Crown newspaper and wrestled for two seasons under Pete Robinson. 

Others affiliated with ODU who have been inducted into the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame:

Sonny Allen (men’s basketball coach); Debbie White (director of sports marketing), Wendy Larry (women’s basketball coach), Ticha Penicheiro (women’s basketball All-American), Marianne Stanley (women’s basketball coach), Beth Anders (field hockey coach), Dr. Jim Jarrett (long-time director of athletics), Tommy Scott (first athletic director and basketball, football and baseball coach, Norfolk Division of the College of William and Mary), Dave Twardzik (men’s basketball All-American), Gray Simons (wrestling coach), Louis Plummer (track coach), Mark West (men’s basketball All-American), Kelli James Prescott (field hockey All-American), Bud Metheny (director of athletics and baseball coach), Nancy Lieberman (women’s basketball All-American), Yogi Hightower-Boothe (field hockey All-American), Anne Donovan (women’s basketball All-American), Paul Webb (men’s basketball coach) and Joseph “Scrap” Chandler (athletic director and track and swimming coach at the Norfolk Division). Dennis Ellmer, an ODU athletics donor and member of the Board of Visitors, was named the hall of fame’s distinguished Virginian in 2022.

Others to be inducted into Hall of Fame in April:

Former Virginia Wesleyan men’s basketball star Brandon Adair, who played at Virginia Beach’s Princess Anne High; Dan Bonner, the former Virginia basketball star and women’s basketball coach and broadcaster; Murray Cook, a baseball field designer who has worked with Major League Baseball for more than three decades; Ali Krieger, a Dumfries, Virginia native and soccer player who starred at Penn State and with the U.S. Women’s National Team; Joe Smith, the Norfolk native and Maury High graduate who starred two seasons at the University of Maryland and then, after being the No. 1 pick in the 1995 NBA draft, played 16 seasons in the NBA; Mike Smith, who won 506 games as the football coach at Hampton High School over 51 years, including 12 state championships; Lou Whitaker, a Martinsville, Va., native who played 19 seasons of Major League Baseball and a five-time All-Star who played a key role in Detroit’s 1984 World Series championship.

Ed George, a Lynchburg native who played football at Ferrum College and Wake Forest and then played 11 seasons of pro ball, will be presented the 2025 Distinguished Virginian Award.

For ticket information for the induction ceremony on Saturday night, April 26, and a “Breakfast with Champions” that morning with the hall of fame inductees, CLICK HERE.