Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Unless you just arrived on this planet via the Hale-Bopp comet or something, you know who Dave Fulkerson is.
The walking, talking "Ticket Master" is better known by his day job as the Warsaw High School athletic director.
Large in stature, Fulkerson has also been big in the promotion of the sport of basketball in the community as well as state-wide. For his efforts, Fulkerson has been named one of five winners this year of the Virgil Sweet Distinguished Service Award. The award is named after the long-time Executive Director of the IBCA (Indiana Basketball Coaches Association) and is given to people "who have provided meritorious services in the promotion of basketball in the state of Indiana."
Fulkerson will receive his award Saturday at the IBCA clinic in Indianapolis. He will be the first AD honored with the award.
The other four winners are sports writers Paul Jankowski, Gene Conrad, Daniel F. Korbs Jr., and basketball coach John Robbins.
"It is quite an honor to have been nominated," Fulkerson said. "It is even more of an honor to receive the award. Virgil Sweet, in Indiana basketball, is legendary."
In his 15 years as AD at Warsaw, Fulkerson has received several awards from different organizations. His modesty compels him not to mention them.
"Part of it is longevity, I have been around for awhile," Fulkerson said. "It is nice to get that recognition, but there are a lot of other people just as deserving or more deserving than I am."
A former basketball coach himself (at White's Institute, Columbia City High School and St. Francis College), Fulkerson is well aware of what the sport means to the state and this area. And being at a place like Warsaw with its three state roundball championships and numerous trips to the Final Four, the promotion of the sport comes naturally to Fulkerson.
"At Warsaw High School, it is easy to promote girls' and boys' basketball because this is a red-hot community," Fulkerson said. "I think that is part of the reason I am getting this award. I feel you don't really even have to promote basketball in Warsaw because of the success. Just walk in the gym and look at the banners. The other sports at Warsaw High School are just as important as basketball, but basketball gets a lot more attention because we are in that red-hot community that enjoys its basketball."
Fulkerson said basketball's popularity in the state was a big reason for the uproar and controversy of the IHSAA deciding to split the state's traditional one-class tournament into four parts starting this winter. If the sport wasn't so popular, then it wouldn't have ignited the kind of passion and loyalty that it did.
"The class basketball thing is the most controversial thing the IHSAA has done in its existence," Fulkerson said. "People will be talking 50-60 years down the road about what happened."
