Local All-American, stock car winner among 6 Fayetteville Sports Club Hall of Fame inductees

A half-dozen locals were inducted into the Fayetteville Sports Club Hall of Fame on Wednesday night, including a pair from Hope Mills.

Melanie Grooms-Garrett and the late Jimmy Edwards Jr. were the inductees from Hope Mills. Grooms-Garrett was a three-sport star in high school and two-sport great in college. Edwards, who died in 2011, remains the area's biggest winner in stock car racing.

Also inducted were Neil Buie, Roy McNeill, Brent Sexton and the late Bob Spicer Sr. This year's class brings the membership to 87, and the Hall of Famers' plaques are on display inside the Crown Coliseum.

Grooms-Garrett, who starred at South View High School and UNC-Pembroke, thanked her mother, brothers and sisters for their contributions in making her a top-shelf athlete. Once she set out in pursuit of her athletic dreams, she said, "My mission became very clear: I had to work very hard to make doors open."

Her grit and determination paid off. As a senior, she was the athlete of the year in volleyball, basketball and softball at South View, and those endeavors earned her a scholarship to UNCP. She became the only NAIA volleyball All-American at the university, and she was an all-conference and all-district softball player. She later coached both sports at her college alma mater, which inducted her into its Hall of Fame in 2003.

Edwards began racing n 1975, and one year later moved up to the premier Late Model ranks. He would capture his 400th win in 2007, and he earned more than a dozen track championships. He competed on both dirt and asphalt, and he outran the likes of NASCAR Hall of Fame members Bobby Allison, David Pearson and Terry Labonte on dirt. In 1979, when he won 40 events, he competed at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the Sun Drop 300 and finished 13th. That night, he took the checkered flag on dirt at Dublin Motor Speedway driving the same car.

Edwards was a hard-nosed, win-at-all-cost competitor, but he had a big heart off the track. He regularly donated bicycles to children who attended events at Fayetteville Motor Speedway, and he once helped raise $3,750 at the track to help cover the funeral expenses of a 12-year-old girl.

Buie, a Fayetteville High graduate, had a distinguished career as a sports official. He began officiating high school sports in 1967, and his career working baseball included five high school state championship series and seven of the same in American Legion action. He worked baseball games at all three NCAA levels. He was also a standout football official, and he has served as the regional supervisor for the local officials since 2013.

NFL referee Brad Allen of Lumberton spoke of the influence Buie has had on his officiating career.

"He gave 100 percent to the coaches, the kids and even the fans," said Allen, who added, "If not for Neil Buie there would be no No. 122,” referring to the number on his own NFL uniform.

McNeill amassed a record of 185-62 during a stint at E.E. Smith High School after previously coaching at Northwest Halifax, Wilson Hunt, Lumberton and Littlefield. He ended his coaching career with six 20-win seasons and nine consecutive state playoff appearances.

"Coaching is about instruction," he said, "not destruction."

A former player at Fayetteville State University, McNeill was inducted into the school's Hall of Fame in 1993.

Sexton, a standout athlete at Terry Sanford High, went on to play at then-Elon College and was drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers.

One of the memories he shared at the banquet was the night he got the breath knocked out of him in a game at Terry Sanford. He said he couldn't get up until one of his teammates said to him, "Brent, if you don't get up off this field right now, your mother's coming out here' -- and I popped right up. You can't have your mom coming out on the field."

Sexton's play was rewarded with a $400 scholarship to Elon, and in a 1971 game versus Gardner-Webb, he intercepted five passes. That caught the eye of NFL scouts, and the Steelers drafted him in the fifth round in 1975. He earned a Super Bowl X ring in the team's 21-17 win over Dallas as the highlight of his pro career.

Spicer, a native of Virginia who died in 2016, earned letters in four sports at Newport News High, and was part of two state championship basketball teams. He also played minor league pro football in that city in the Dixie Football League.

But baseball was his best sport, and he won 166 games in a 15-year minor-league career. He appeared in four major league games for the Kansas City Athletics in the 1955-56 seasons.

Spicer played for the Fayetteville Cubs in 1948-49 and eventually settled in the city. A son, Bobby Spicer Jr., said his father excelled at every sport, from billiards "all the way to tiddlywinks."