Longtime Maine basketball commissioner Peter Webb, veteran Bangor High School athletic administrator Steve Vanidestine and University of Maine women’s basketball coach Amy Vachon are among a seven-person class to be inducted into the Maine Sports Legends Hall of Honors on June 23 at Jeff’s Catering & Events Center in Brewer.
Also set for induction are Kevin Sjoberg, the late G. Caroline Morris, William “Pop” Mangum and Tom Warren.
The honorees have been chosen by regional committees for their accomplishments and contributions to youth and sports in Maine. Their willingness to participate in this event will assist the Maine Sports Legends in its efforts to provide student-athlete funding, the primary goal of the organization.
Magnum, a Pennsylvania native, enrolled at UMaine in 1973 after serving in Vietnam. He soon began a career of helping children, particularly those with special needs, through jobs at the Bangor YMCA and with UMaine summer sports camps, and primarily as a special advocate for southern Penobscot County schools and the Penobscot Job Corps.
Vanidestine is a 1970 alumnus of Bangor High School where he played football and baseball. He went on to graduate from UMaine before starting his career in education as an assistant teacher at Bangor High in 1976.
He eventually became the school’s athletic director in 1984, and since then Bangor teams have captured 72 Class A state championships.
Morris’ education career started in Masardis and Portage and continued in Ashland for 43 years until her retirement in 1974. She coached girls basketball at Ashland Community High School where her teams did not lose a game from 1952 through 1962.
Morris was named Maine’s 1962 Teacher of the Year and was involved in education at the national, state and local levels throughout her life.
Webb graduated from Houlton High School and Ricker College in Houlton, where he excelled in baseball and basketball. The UMaine graduate went on to teach and serve as a school administrator for 22 years while also officiating more than 2,000 high school, college and professional basketball games, and umpiring more than 1,000 baseball games.
Webb served on the executive committee of the International Association of Approved Basketball Officials for 13 years and for the past 27 years has been Maine’s basketball commissioner.
Sjoberg graduated from Caribou High School and UMaine before starting his journalism career in 1988 as a sports and news reporter at The Aroostook Republican and News in Caribou. In 1993 he became sports editor at both the Aroostook Republican and The Presque Isle Star Herald, a position he held until this March.
Sjoberg also has been an active sports broadcaster for more than two decades, covering County high school basketball on the radio or through video streaming. He started as a color commentator for the local public access television and has since worked games for WEGP, Channel X and currently WHOU.
The two-time Maine Sportswriter of the Year now is employed as a morning host at Channel X radio in Caribou.
Warren, a Massachusetts native and former three-year starter at outside linebacker at UMaine, serves as chief executive officer of the Kennebec Valley YMCA in Augusta and also is president of the YMCA Alliance of Maine.
Vachon has coached the UMaine women’s basketball team since 2017 and last winter guided the Black Bears to their second straight America East conference championship.
A two-year captain for the UMaine women’s basketball team as a player, she helped the Black Bears to four straight NCAA Tournament appearances and was part of the 1999 team that upset Stanford in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
Vachon was the state’s 1996 Miss Maine Basketball after her senior season at Cony High School of Augusta, where she was a four-time All-Maine guard who helped the Rams capture two Class A state championships.
The Maine Sports Legends banquet, a buffet, will begin at 1:30 p.m. following a social half-hour. Tickets for reserved seating at tables of eight are $40 each and must be purchased by June 20. For more ticket information, call Jeff’s Catering and Events Center at 207-989-1811.
