SALISBURY —  With massive names such as Javon Hargrave and K.P. Parks entering the Salisbury-Rowan Hall of Fame, Saturday’s induction ceremonies for the Class of 2022 turned out to be the biggest party so far.

Cameras flashed, laughter roared and tears of joy flowed for 150 minutes at the Salisbury Civic Center.

“This is more exciting than being a child on Christmas Eve,” said inductee Lisa Staton Dyer, as she surveyed a full room of famous athletes and their guests.

Kent Bernhardt returned as master of ceremonies. Dennis Davidson and Scott Maddox co-chaired a 12-person committee that made the selections from a long list of deserving athletes.

Gilbert Sprinkle, the oldest inductee in the new class, turned out to be friskiest speaker. He had attendees rolling in the aisles with PG-rated … or maybe R-rated … anecdotes from his college adventures at Appalachian State.

Thirteen were inducted on Saturday, helping to make up for the 2020 and 2021 classes that were lost to COVID.  With double the normal number entering the Hall of Fame, inductees were asked to limit their remarks to seven minutes. Sprinkle got on a roll during his monologue and went past his allotted time, but no one seemed to mind.

Inductees were threatened with being tackled by committee members if they spoke too long, but it was an empty threat. Parks, Romar Morris and Ernest Wiggins II all looked to be in playing shape. Committee members couldn’t have tackled Parks and they couldn’t have caught Morris and Wiggins, the fastest athletes to come out of Rowan County.

Inductions are made in alphabetical order, so Todd DeSorbo was the lead-off man. The first to be inducted for the sport of swimming, DeSorbo sounded almost apologetic for being inducted in the same year as famous pros such as Hargrave, but his credentials were second to none. Swimming has taken him on a journey from high school state champ to national college coach of the year at the University of Virginia. He’s coached USA teams in international competition, including the Olympics.

Attendees found out DeSorbo actually liked soccer more than swimming in his Salisbury High days in the 1990s.

“I enjoyed playing soccer,” DeSorbo said. “But no one plays swimming.”

Dyer’s biggest claim to fame was being the first All-America track and field athlete for UNC.

The former Salisbury High standout credited a full village of supporters and ballet training and the timing it gave her for her success in the track jumps.

North Rowan graduate Hargrave is preparing for a Monday night game for the undefeated Philadelphia Eagles, so Tim Bates accepted his plaque.

Hargrave, who is enjoying an NFL career that has included  32.5 sacks and a Pro Bowl appearance, spoke to the crowd at the Civic Center via a taped message. Hargrave, who recently piled up five sacks in a five-day span,  got credit for one of the shortest acceptance speeches in history. It lasted 22 seconds.

Ricky Holt, a Salisbury and Catawba athlete, made his mark as a coach and administrator after launching his teaching/coaching career in Rowan County at the request of Rick Hampton.

“As a coach at A.L. Brown I learned communication from Bruce Hardin and patience from Shelwyn Klutz,” Holt said.

He carried those lessons with him. He had overwhelming success at Carver and Winston-Salem Prep.

He had a hand in teams that won 13 state titles. Six more were state runner-up.

Devon Williams Jarvis is a ground-breaking inductee for   fast-pitch softball. She was the tournament MVP for her work in the circle for West Rowan’s state champions in 2002 and 2003. She was humble about her playing days, which also included four years as a starting third baseman for Maryland.

“Those were great teams at West and I was just a piece of the puzzle and never thought of myself as the most important piece,” she said. “Hopefully, a lot more ladies from those teams will be standing up here at the podium in the years to come.”

Jarvis is one of the rising stars among attorneys in the state. She’s also juggling her soaring career with being a wife and mom.

“Being a mom is a lot tougher than sports,” Jarvis said. “Moms have the toughest job of all.”

Daniel Moore, the former North Rowan, Rowan Legion and UNC left-hander revealed that he was a classic late-bloomer.

“When I was 13, I was the 10th-best guy on a 10-man team,” he said.

But the 6-foot-5 lefty had the bloodlines (father Jack and brother Sandy had been exceptional pitchers), he got encouragement and guidance from coaches such as Bill Kesler, Jim DeHart, Jim Gantt and Paul Benfield, and he was willing to put in the work. By his junior year at North Rowan, he was one of the state’s best pitchers. As a senior in 2000, he led the Cavaliers to the 2A state championship series and was named the Gatorade Player of the Year for North Carolina.

He was UNC’s MVP in 2003 and was a second-round draft pick by the San Diego Padres.

“I was fortunate to grow up in a very special place and with a newspaper that made you feel like an all-star,” Moore said.

Morris, one of the great sprinters in county history, won five individual state championships during his time at Salisbury High.

He starred in football, setting a slew of school records that have been broken this season by JyMikaah Wells, a back whom Morris trains.

Morris, who also competed in basketball in high school, was the NCHSAA Male Athlete of the Year for the 2010-11 school year.

He had a fine athletic career at UNC, spent some time with the New York Jets and finished his career in the Canadian Football League.

Morris and West Rowan’s Parks are now on the same side through the Next Generation Defenders sports teams.

Parks is one the county’s athletic legends and put up high school football stats that made him a national figure. His career included mind-boggling numbers including 10,915 rushing yards and 158 touchdowns. He scored 59 TDs his senior year and was a Parade All-America, AP North Carolina Player of the Year and  Shrine Bowl MVP.

Surprisingly, his first love was basketball, but West football coach Scott Young was a huge influence on Parks.

“Scott Young was real, never sugar-coated anything,” Parks said. “I’d get 250 yards and he’d tell me ‘that didn’t look like the KP I know.’ He always pushed me.”

He turned in All-ACC seasons at Virginia and recently was named as the best player ever to wear the No. 25 jersey for the Cavaliers.

Parks said he kept fighting after that depressing day when he wasn’t drafted by the NFL.

“Went and played pro ball in Germany and did what I thought I would do,” Parks said.

It was in Germany he discovered a passion for training athletes and instructing young players, and he brought those skills back home to Rowan County.

Sprinkle was a star athlete in high school at North Rowan, especially in basketball, but received no scholarship offers even after his coach, Walt Baker, wrote to every program in the state on his behalf.

He went to Appalachian State and was cut, but he eventually got on the jayvee team and worked his way up to the varsity. He had an excellent senior season, scoring 13 points per game and leading Appalachian State to the Carolinas Conference Tournament title.

Men such as Baker had inspired him to become a coach, and he coached many sports as East Rowan. He coached 100 boys basketball wins and two championship teams and he coached championship golf teams, including a state runner-up.

Sprinkle said his wife, Joyce, whom he married as a senior at Appalachian, had been writing letters to the Hall of Fame committee requesting his induction for 20 years. He asked her to join him at the podium.

“Well, we’re in the Hall of Fame now,” he announced with a laugh. “No more letter-writing.”

Sappia Venn, a native of Liberia, starred at Salisbury High for coach Tom Sexton and brought a new level of soccer to Rowan County in the 1990s.

“I thought I was good at soccer, but Coach Sexton taught me a lot,” Venn said. “He gave my game structure.”

Venn, who is Morris’ cousin, is the first to be inducted for that sport.

Venn set a record for career goals (151) that still stands and received an All-America award from none other than Pele´.

His success on the pitch continued at Spartanburg Methodist, where he was all-region for a national championship team and at UNC Greensboro, where he led the nation in assists.

Wiggins had his time as one of the top sprinters in the USA and the world.

A late-bloomer at South Rowan, his first track and field efforts were simply to get in shape for football, the sport he loved,

Track is where he blossomed in a big way. He set the county record in the 100 meters with a 10.22 clocking.

He was a two-time All-American for the Appalachian StateMountaineers, a six-time Southern Conference champion and the school’s Male Athlete of the Year for 2004. He broke school records at three distances.

He was a 4×100 alternate for the Olympics and represented the USA in numerous international events.

“I’ve competed against the best in the world. all over the world,” Wiggins said. “But this is the biggest day of my life because I’m being inducted into the Hall of Fame from the place where I’m from. I’m just a kid from Neely Town (a China Grove neighborhood) who found a passion for running and found his lane.”

Now Wiggins is a motivational speaker and one of the top trainers of athletes in Florida.

Carl Marlin Jr., who died in 2020, received the Fred M. Evans Award for community service through sports.

A standout football at J.C. Price High, where he was known as “Jet” Marlin in the mid-1960s, he coached youth basketball and football for North Rowan youngsters for 40 years and was part of North’s football chain-gang crew for many years.

“He had a passion for sports and a passion for young people,” said  Christal McRae, who accepted her father’s award.

Wayne Hinshaw, who has taken sports photos for the Salisbury Post for 51 years, received the Horace Billings Lifetime Achievement Award.

Hinshaw was an athlete at Randleman High, but a knee injury stopped his playing career. He found an outlet through photography and taught himself the craft.

He came to Catawba College as a student and was introduced to Rowan County athletics.

In 1971, he became part of the Post staff and was chief photographer for many years for news as well as sports.

He’s won 50-plus state-level awards and was Photographer of the Year for the Carolinas in 1975.

Hinshaw figures he shot photos of almost all of Saturday’s inductees at some point.

“The better the competition, the better pictures you get,” Hinshaw said. “I was able to record through photos their moments in history, the moments of their lives.”

The new class brings the Hall of Fame’s membership to 138 (124 men and 14 women).

Work on another class will begin in the spring.