Pasted below is Mike Korcek's piece on Walt Owens:

'COACH O', ATHLETE, HALL OF FAMER, LIFE MENTOR, RACIAL PIONEER: WALT OWENS ANSWERED TO ALL[/u]
By MIKE KORCEK
Multi-sport athlete. Hall of Famer. Educator, father figure, pioneer, and life counselor. Or just “Coach O.”
Whether it was the Northern Illinois University community or his native Detroit during a 54-year teaching career, the man who answered to all of those platitudes, Walt Owens died Sunday at age 87.
“I believe this was on his Hall of Fame plaque in the Convocation Center. In essence, it read ‘how many NIU students did Walt mentor or impact?’ I am certainly one of them,” said Rick Cerrone, former New York Yankees public relations director and current editor-in-chief of Baseball Digest magazine. “From the first time I met him in 1973, I learned something every time I talked to him. He was a treasure.”
Commented NIU Hall of Famer Kenny Battle (1984-86): “He was a mentor to all of us who went through NIU. He kept us on track in the classroom, on campus. ‘Coach O’ meant a lot to people at NIU.”
Added Lisa Gilfoy, a member of the Hall of Fame 1988 Northern Illinois women’s softball team that advanced to the NCAA College World Series: “One of my favorite teachers...”
Owens came to NIU in 1973-74 as faculty and an assistant men’s basketball coach under head man Emory Luck for three seasons, remained on John McDougal’s cage staff for two more winters, then concentrated on his duties as the Huskies’ head baseball coach during 1976-82 before joining the academic ranks.
His top contribution to Northern Illinois hoops might have been the recruitment of maybe the most prolific scorer in program history. In the mid-1970s, a coaching friend in Detroit told Owens he had to see this kid in Saginaw. It was a one-man, 6-foot-5 point machine named Paul Dawkins who would operate in Chick Evans Field House as “Doctor D”, score 1,736 career points, average a school-record 26.7 ppg. as a senior, play for the Utah Jazz, and become a member of NIU’s Athletics Hall of Fame.
In baseball, Owens would produce 133 coaching triumphs---third-best in program history. His best Northern Illinois campaign would be a 26-13-2 mark in 1977. “Coach O’ tutored two Mid-American Conference batting champions in Clayton Armstrong (.438 average) in 1977 and Mark Boothe (.439) in 1980, plus MAC home run leader Jeff Sevenich (12) in 1980 and loop stolen base king Alvin Maynard (41) in 1979. The Owens era produced ten All-Mid-Am performers, headed by first-teamers Jay Graziano (1976), Mike Avallone (1977), and Maynard (1980).
“There’s one reason I came to Northern---and that’s Walt,” said Dr. Gordon Nuber, a two-time NIU Athletics Hall of Famer and recently retired Chicago Bears, Cubs, and Blackhawks team physician who resides in the suburbs. “I wouldn’t have been in Chicago without his guidance. He was my connection. His friendship with Emory Luck got me to NIU. I will always appreciate my time there.”
Lest we forget, Nuber said that in the late 1960s at Detroit Denby High School, everybody called him “Coach O.”
Nuber, a 6-foot-7 basketball standout at Denby under Owens, lettered three years (1970-73) for Northern Illinois head coach Tom Jorgensen when Luck was his assistant. “Walt seemed to know everybody or had a story about everybody in Detroit,” Nuber added. “John Mayberry. Willie Horton. Alex Johnson. Spencer Haywood. He got me in a Michigan all-star game with all his connections.”
A three-sport star at Detroit Northwestern High School, Owens coached four sports at Denby. He led his DHS quintets to three Class A District titles and two in baseball. Owens also taught at Cass Tech and Mumford high schools, the latter where he hired Luck as a basketball assistant in 1962-63.
At Western Michigan University, Owens played basketball and ran track. As a senior in 1955, he ran on the Bronco 880-yard relay team which set a MAC record in the league championship meet. Owens earned his Bachelor of Arts (1955) and Master of Arts (1968) degrees from WMU.
Unknown for years was the fact that Owens was a pitcher / outfielder for the Detroit Stars of the Negro American League for three summers (1953-55). Advised to stay in school, he performed under an assumed name to maintain his amateur status. In two at-bats vs. the legendary Satchel Paige one season, Owens hit a single and struck out. In 1957, Owens integrated baseball in his city by joining the previously all-white Detroit Pepsi-Cola team.
On the hardwood back in the day, Owens performed against the Canadian Olympic team. As a member of the Boston Whirlwinds and a Bevo Francis teammate, “Coach O” provided the opposition vs. the Harlem Globetrotters.
In 2008, Major League Baseball honored surviving Negro League players who could not play in the big leagues due to their race. In a special draft, all 30 MLB clubs picked for a former NLB player. Owens was drafted by the Cubs.
As an emeritus NIU professor in 2011, Owens received the E.B. Henderson Award, which acknowledges those who have made outstanding contributions and development of their community for leadership in opposing racial discrimination in his profession and society. At NIU, he chaired the Presidential Commission on the Status of Minorities and served as a member of the Task Force on Racial Discrimination and Sexual Harassment. Owens was also a board member of the National Congress of Black Faculty and a member of the Illinois Committee on Black Concerns in Higher Education.
Owens is a member of the NIU athletics, the Negro League Baseball, and the Detroit Negro Slow-Pitch Softball League halls of fame. He participated in local softball until 2007.
At the turn of the century when Northern Illinois hosted a series of men's basketball alumni games, I was fortunate enough to be one of the "head coaches" (as reward for riding the bus from 1966 to 2006) with Walt as "my assistant." Many thanks for the support and substitution suggestions, "Coach O." He will be missed.
Funeral arrangements are pending. Owens is survived by his wife, Jan, and four children. His oldest son, Mel, was an All-State linebacker at DeKalb High School, an All-Big Ten performer at the University of Michigan, and a nine-year player with the Los Angeles Rams.