Following up on its successful Black History Month features in February, the Allstate Sugar Bowl Sports Awards Committee will commemorate Women's History Month in March by highlighting the accomplishments of five female sports legends from New Orleans. The five women, all members of the Allstate Sugar Bowl's
New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame, cover over 75 years of women's sports history in New Orleans. They represent basketball, golf, softball, and track and field and include athletes who traveled the world while also excelling right here in the Crescent City.
The Sugar Bowl will share these memorable stories via its social media channels throughout the month of March.
New Orleans Legends:
Ashley Brignac, Softball, John Curtis, 2004-12
Carmen Jones, Basketball, McMain/Tulane, 1982-90
Nina Korgan, Softball, 1942-48
Grace Daley, Basketball, Tulane, 1997-2006
Pamela Jiles, Track, Abramson HS/Dillard/Olympics, 1971-77
Pamela Jiles, Track, Abramson HS/Dillard/Olympics, 1971-77
Pamela Jiles, a star New Orleans sprinter from Abramson High School and the New Orleans Super Dames club team, earned a silver medal for the United States in the 4×400-meter relay at the 1976 Olympics in Montreal. She also won two gold medals and a silver at the 1975 Pan American Games in Mexico City. She was inducted into the Allstate Sugar Bowl's New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame in 2002.
In the 1975 Pan Am Games, Jiles nearly collected three gold medals. She won the 100-meter dash with a time of 11.38 seconds and anchored the USA 4×100-meter relay team to a Pan Am Games record time of 42.90 seconds for another gold. In the 200-meter dash, Jiles and teammate Chandra Cheeseborough had a photo finish. The gold was awarded to Cheeseborough and Jiles settled for silver with a time of 22.81 seconds – her personal-record.
Ranked No. 4 in the world in the 200 and No. 6 in the 100 in 1975, Jiles posted fourth-place finishers in both the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes at the 1976 U.S. Olympic Trials in Eugene, Ore, to earn a spot on the 1976 USA Olympic Team. Her 11.31 time in the 100 at the Trials was her personal-record.
During the 1976 Olympic finals, Jiles was a surprise pick to run a leg for the mile-relay team as she did not specialize in the 400 meters. Her choice was justified however, when she ran a 51.3 leg in the final to help the USA to a time of 3:22.81 and the silver medal.
The 1976 Olympic results are quite controversial in retrospect as that was the height of the Eastern-bloc countries documented usage of performance-enhancing drugs. The Gold Medal 4×400 relay team in Montreal was from East Germany, which was found to have been one of the leaders in the doping culture. The USA's silver medal in the mile relay was it's only women's running medal (the only other medal for the USA in women's track and field was a silver medal in the long jump).
Jiles ran a personal-best 52.64 in the 400 in 1977.
Born in New Orleans on July 10, 1955, Jiles attended Dillard University which didn't have a track program at the time. After her Olympic performance, she attended LSU and competed for the Tiger track team for one year.
Grace Daley, Basketball, Tulane, 1997-2006
Lisa Stockton had been Tulane's head women's basketball coach for a little more than a year in the fall of 1995 when a guard from Ocala, Florida, decided to sign with the Green Wave.
It would change the immediate course of the program.
Over the next four seasons, Grace Daley would put up numbers unmatched to this day by a Tulane basketball player, male or female, lead her team to multiple conference championships and four straight NCAA Tournaments and become the highest draft pick in program history.
For her career achievements, Daley was one of four inductees in the Class of 2023 into the Allstate Sugar Bowl's New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame.
As a shooting guard coming out of Lake Weir High School, Daley had narrowed her college choice to two.
"Tulane did their homework," she said. "I'm a church girl. Tulane took me to the House of Blues for a gospel brunch. I absolutely fell in love with the city and the campus."
As quickly as Daley was sold on Tulane, she made an impact on the floor.
Stockton "was going to make me into the best player I could possibly be," Daley said. "The team always came first."
And while the points would pile up, so would the wins. The Green Wave went 99-23 in Daley's four seasons in a Tulane uniform.
What made her different?
"Most players can shoot or drive," Stockton said in an interview during Daley's junior season, "but she's a scorer who can do both.
"She has so many aspects to her game. She's a competitor. When the game gets close, she plays better. If you had two like her, you could probably win a national championship."
As a freshman in 1996-97, Daley averaged 13.2 points per game as Tulane won the regular-season and tournament championships in Conference USA and earned a No. 4 seed in the NCAA Tournament. She was named the league's Freshman of the Year.
Her sophomore season, Daley averaged 20.1 points and shot better than 50 percent from the field. She would not only be an honorable mention selection on the Kodak All-American team for the first of three consecutive seasons, but she was named the conference's Defensive Player of the Year after averaging 2.9 steals per game.
After being slowed by a stress fracture in her foot early in her junior season, the scoring average dropped slightly to 19.1 points per game, but Tulane again claimed regular-season and tournament titles in CUSA.
Daley saved the best for last as a senior, averaging 21.6 points per game and earning CUSA Player of the Year honors.
Along the way in that final season, Daley passed Stacey Gaudet as the career scoring leader in Tulane women's basketball history, and then put the cherry on top by surpassing Jerald Honeycutt's record in men's basketball. She would finish her career in the olive and blue with 2,249 points.
"I didn't even know that record existed," Daley said, "and I never set out to get it."
Daley left New Orleans with some great memories and friends.
"We won a number of conference championships and I got a lot of awards," she said, "but it's really the camaraderie that I had with my teammates. I was surrounded by so much talent and we actually liked each other and got along. I didn't realize how unique that was until I left Tulane."
Following her senior season, Daley would become one of the highest draft picks in any sport in Tulane athletic history, going fifth overall in the 2000 WNBA Draft to the Minnesota Lynx.
"She's that prototype athlete the WNBA is looking for," Stockton said on the eve of the draft.
Daley played four years in the WNBA and seven seasons overseas before returning to her hometown to teach and help others.
"My teammates may change and my coaches may change, but my mindset doesn't change," she said. "The work ethic was instilled at Tulane. It's still with me now."
Daley returned to campus in December 2006 when her No. 4 was retired – only the second Tulane women's basketball player, along with Gaudet, to earn that honor.
Daley's latest honor gives her the opportunity to help spread her faith-based message even further.
"It's absolutely a huge honor," Daley said of her selection. "It will give me a higher platform to help serve the real MVPs out there – the most vulnerable people."
Story by Lenny Vangilder of the Greater New Orleans Sports Awards Committee.
Nina Korgan, Softball, 1942-48 – March 18
Nina "Tiger" Korgan had established herself as a professional softball star before joining the powerhouse New Orleans Jax Maids in 1942 but shortly after coming to New Orleans, she was widely recognized as the greatest softball pitcher of all-time. With Korgan on board, the Jax Maids would win five softball national championships in the next eight years – a period when industrial league softball was highly competitive around the country. Top softball players were hired to work for prominent businesses while playing for their elite promotional softball teams – like Jackson Brewing in New Orleans sponsoring the Jax Maids.
Korgan, recognized as one of the top pitchers in softball history, essentially stumbled into the role. After graduating from high school, she wanted to join a local softball team, but she had the date mixed up for practice and when she arrived, the only vacant position was pitcher. And the legend was born.
From 1934-48, she played on six American Softball Association (ASA) national championship teams, including five with the Jax Maids. She pitched for the Syracuse (Nebraska) Blue Birds from 1935-37, leading them to state championships all three years and posting a 95-5 record, and Thames (Mo.) from 1938-40. Her first national championship came in 1941 with the Higgins Midgets of Tulsa, Okla., when she completely dominated the national tournament. In 30 innings of work, she struck out 67 batters and hurled four shutouts, including a perfect game with 20 strikeouts. She allowed only five hits in the four games – one of those came in a 1-0 victory over New Orleans.
When the Midgets were disbanded following their national title, she moved to New Orleans for the 1942 season. Korgan extended her scoreless inning streak in the ADA national tourney to 67 innings before giving up a run in the seventh inning of the 1942 championship game in Detroit. Korgan won four games in that tourney with three of them one-hitters.
Korgan and the Jax Maids would repeat in 1943, defeating a Phoenix entry, but a team from Portland, Ore., took the 1944 title. New Orleans returned to the top the following year to start a three-year stretch of national championships. They knocked off teams from Toronto (1945), Chicago (1946) and New York City (1947) in the title games.
She was lauded regularly in print: "Nina Korgan, the Walter Johnson of girls' softball…" said the Associated Press. "Nina Korgan likely has no equal as a girls' softball pitcher. She enjoys the distinction of being the world's best…" said the Charlotte Observer. "Her record in incomparable. She has a magnetic personality and moves about with the grace of a leopard. She's a champion and looks it…" said Scoop Kennedy. "The Bob Feller of the ladies' league…" said The Saturday Evening Post.
She would remain with the Jax Maids until retiring from competition in 1949. She worked for the Jackson Brewing Company until retiring in 1978.
Korgan was born February 1, 1916 in Council Bluffs, Iowa, and attended Abraham Lincoln High School where she was a star athlete in every discipline she attempted. The Council Bluffs Nonpareil wrote the following in 1944:
"No one ever questioned her right to be called this city's greatest girl athlete of all-time…she played volleyball, basketball, baseball, captainball, soccer and tennis, won prizes pitching horseshoes, shot a mean rifle and scarcely had to draw a breath to win any event she chose to enter in the various high school girls' track and field playground meets. She was city champion in the baseball far throw, high jump and broad jump, and captained the city championship girls' basketball team."
She was inducted into the ASA National Softball Hall of Fame in 1960 and the Nebraska Amateur Softball Association Hall of Fame in 1979. She died on July 19, 2009 in Sand Springs, Okla., at the age of 93.
Carmen Jones, Basketball, McMain/Tulane, 1982-90 – March 13
From her earliest days, Carmen Jones enjoyed playing sports. She and her brother Herbert Jr., who is one year older, were best friends and did it all – from tennis to basketball to tackle football. But from her earliest days, while she had fun playing sports, Jones' desire was to be better every day. That drive resulted in her becoming one of the greatest all-around basketball players in New Orleans history and now a member of the Greater New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame.
After her earliest days playing on the Uptown streets and playgrounds with her brother; she moved into organized sports and quickly learned that she had ability – including when she starred on boys teams or played up three and four grades with girls. In middle school, she won her first championship (a city tournament in basketball), and in high school, she established herself as a star at Eleanor McMain Magnet School. A college career to be remembered at Tulane would follow. Throughout her life, the lessons instilled in her by her parents, Paula and Herbert Jones, stayed with her.
"High standards were in our family," Jones said. "In whatever you're doing, you give 100%...or more! You can be ordinary, or you can be extraordinary. I always wanted to be extraordinary.
"I also went to Bible study classes and had some great leaders that had God's spirit in them. Their influence made a major impact on me. I always wanted to be a better person with good character and a positive nature. I was very lucky to have great experiences with great mentors."
Jones had established herself as an elite athlete early, but her legendary career nearly hit a permanent roadblock in high school – McMain didn't have high school varsity sports. After much cajoling from Jones and her talented teammates, and despite not having a gym of its own, McMain agreed to start athletic programs from scratch.
"Nobody expected us to do anything," Jones remembered. "But the first two years in basketball, we were always in the top three in the city. And in other sports, we kept improving. All of us on the teams had a kind of resiliency about us. And we all went from sport to sport."
Not only did the McMain teams improve quickly, but Jones developed into a star in whatever she attempted – she was a two-time all-state selection in basketball (for coach Joyce Gill), a two-time state champion in track (for legendary coach Zachary Winfield), an all-district selection in volleyball, and a National Honor Society student.
Her junior year in basketball (1984-85), she averaged 21.6 points per game and led McMain to a 26-2 record and the state quarterfinals. And in her senior year (1985-86), she averaged 29 points, 10 rebounds, and five assists while leading McMain to an 18-2 record. She was the Class 2A state MVP, the Metro Small Schools MVP, the District 11-AA MVP, and she played in the LHSAA All-Star Game.
After her junior season of basketball, she joined the track and field team and led McMain to the Class 2A state title in track and field by winning the state championship in the 400-meter dash and running on the district and regional championship 4x400 team.
As a senior, she won the district and regional championship and finished third in the state in the 100-meter hurdles. She also ran a leg of the state champion 4x400 relay.
She was selected as the Times-Picayune/States-Item Female Prep Athlete of the Year as both a junior and senior.
After her outstanding McMain career, Jones had earned the opportunity to continue her basketball career at the neighborhood college – Tulane University. While Tulane featured a campus through which she had ridden her bike many times and a library in which she and her high school classmates would do research and work on projects, it was not seen as attainable to many in the neighborhood.
"Being a young minority kid in New Orleans, it wasn't like Tulane was reaching out to you." Jones remembered. "To have them reach out and say they wanted me, it had a huge impact on my decision to go there. To have a scholarship to handle the financial side and for my family to be able to easily watch my games, it was amazing."
Head coach Joline Matsunami told Jones that she usually didn't play freshman, but during early season scrimmages Jones quickly proved she wouldn't be riding the bench. If Matsunami didn't have plans to play a freshman, she sure didn't expect one to start, but after 10 games coming off the bench, Jones cracked the starting lineup. She wouldn't come off the bench again in her career.
At the completion of her four-year career with the Green Wave, Jones dominated the school's record book – she was No. 1 in rebounds (744), No. 1 in steals (315), No. 2 in scoring (1,876), No. 2 in field goals (723), No. 2 in free throws (380), and No. 3 in assists (367). Over 30 years after her career ended, she still ranks in the top 10 in 11 career categories (including fourth all-time in scoring) and eight single-season categories for the Green Wave. She still holds the Tulane records for career steals and single-season scoring average (24.6 ppg in 1989-90) and her 43 points versus Alabama in 1990 are the single-game record. She remains the only Green Wave women's basketball player to score 40 points in a game.
Her top on-court memories from her Tulane career include the 43-point effort against Alabama, a near quadruple-double during her junior season (missed by just two assists), and a legendary finish against New Orleans rival Xavier as a senior.
"I really didn't want to lose that game," Jones said. "I had a good first half, but the string came out of my shorts in the second half and they kept falling down; I wasn't comfortable at all. They hit a shot to go up three with about five seconds left. I took the in-bounds and then a couple dribbles and hit a three-pointer with one second left – and they fouled me! I hit the free throw and we won [52-51]."
While there were some overseas professional basketball opportunities in 1990, there wasn't a WNBA or anything equivalent. Jones continued basketball the way she started, by playing with the boys in various men's leagues. She has also been a successful coach at the high school and AAU levels.
Jones, who raised and coached three children, Diana, Donald II, and Caitlen, is currently working at Dillard University. While her role at Dillard does keep her in touch with basketball as she develops a referee certification program, her primary work focuses on I.N.S.P.I.R.E., a reading incentive program. The non-profit, whose acronym stands for Increase Student Performance In Reading Excellence, is dedicated to increasing the quality of students' reading by recognizing and rewarding their efforts. She has also worked as a courtside administrator for the NBA for the past five years.
"The number one thing I learned from sports is how to work together as a team," Jones said. "You can't get anywhere in life without being able to work with people – you need communication, accountability, teamwork, and passion. In sports, I just wanted to be better every day; whatever I needed to do to be better tomorrow is what I wanted to do. That has carried over from sports. I'm going to put in the time, the effort, to reach that point of improving, being better, every day."
Ashley Brignac, Softball, John Curtis, 2004-12
When collegiate head softball coaches from around the nation were courting John Curtis senior pitcher Ashley Brignac in 2007, she returned home from an official visit to the University of Tennessee with the Volunteers uppermost on her list of choices.
"Tennessee was No. 1," she recalled.
After considering Alabama, Baylor and LSU among a host of pursuers, Brignac had just one visit remaining – 150 miles west on I-10 to the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, a school, a town and a culture about which, she would later admit, she knew very little.
"I come from a meat and potatoes family," she said. "I had never, never in my life heard of anyone putting potato salad in gumbo. I didn't even eat rice. But it was the people in Lafayette who won me over. And the (Cajun) culture. I loved the way they turned out and filled the stands every time we played and they made so much noise. UL was like home. And, had I not gone to UL, I never would have met my husband (Blake). UL was a perfect fit. UL was phenomenal."
And, Ashley Brignac (Domec) was phenomenal at UL.
As a result of her unequaled softball accomplishments on the high school and collegiate levels, Brignac was elected to the Allstate Sugar Bowl's New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame for 2022.
On the diamond, her career statistical successes at both schools almost read like fiction:
- In her final four seasons at Curtis from 2004-07 under Coach Kristy Hebert, Brignac compiled an overall record of 122-4, with four consecutive state championships.
- She struck out 1,454 of the 2,037 batters she faced (71 percent) and had unheard-of earned run averages of 0.00 during her entire junior and senior seasons.
- She was selected as the National Gatorade Player of the Year in 2007.
- As a senior, Brignac was 25-0 with 421 strikeouts as she allowed just 14 hits in 160 innings pitched, with 21 no-hitters and seven perfect games.
"There was no such thing as an off-season for her," said Hebert. "She worked out in the gym day and night. She had great natural ability and she was not going to let anything get in her way.
"I was a little shocked when she picked UL, but she wanted to stay home and make a difference."
And the difference she made in Lafayette was impactful and immediate.
As a freshman, she finished with a 31-7 record, including 13 shutouts, three no-hitters and one perfect game. She was chosen the Sun Belt Pitcher of the Year, the first of three such awards. The Ragin' Cajuns advanced to the Women's College World Series where Brignac struck out 15 in a 3-2 victory against No. 1-ranked Florida. UL came home with a fifth-place national finish.
UL was 201-45 during her five-year career which included missing the entire 2010 season with a torn labrum in her pitching shoulder. She still managed to account for 94 of those 201 victories.
"I had the surgery after my sophomore year," said Brignac. "I had eight anchors placed in my shoulder. I had a long rehab and could not pitch for six months."
Nonetheless, she still managed a 23-4 record as a senior following the injury.
"I was a different pitcher post injury," she said. "I was not as fast. I had to develop a new skill with a new arm. The riser (fastball) was my everything pitch. It was my jam pitch."
But she also developed a "drop" curve and a screwball.
Brignac's initial experience as a softball pitcher came at a young age when she put her imagination to good use and was able to master that unorthodox, circular pitching motion within the confines of her bedroom.
"I took a bunch of socks and rolled them into a ball. Then I tried to hit the part of my room where the ceiling touched the corner."
She would eventually begin her softball experience as a shortstop.
"Sports taught me exactly how much a person must work for a chance at success. There are times when you are going through this grind and you wonder how long will this continue? It's like, where will it get you? But you eventually learn all the work was an investment. It pays off."
Today Brignac and her husband have two children, Cooper and Bennett.
As someone who knew first-hand the anguish of major surgery, she now owns, ironically enough, an orthopedic clinic with a specialty: "It's a one-stop shop for shoulders," says Ashley Brignac, speaking from experience.
Story by Bill Bumgarner of the Greater New Orleans Sports Awards Committee
