The Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame announced its 2027 class on Thursday, the most diverse group of inductees in the history of the Magnolia State sports shrine.
The class, which will be inducted in ceremonies next July, includes three women, three football greats and two Major League Baseball standouts.
In alphabetical order, they are: Mississippi State football great John Bond, Jackson State and Major League Baseball standout Dave Clark, Southern Miss and professional football linebacker Rod Davis, Pearl native and Olympic gold medalist sprinter Bianca Knight, Ole Miss All American and 10-year NFL veteran Kris Mangum, Ole Miss and Major League Baseball star Seth Smith, Mississippi State and WNBA basketball great LaToya Thomas and Shirley Gibbs Walker, who coached Alcorn State to 493 victories and 12 SWAC basketball championships.
A brief bio of each:
John Bond
Few athletes in Mississippi State history made such an immediate impact as John Bond did on Bulldog football. The Bulldogs were 3-8 in 1979, Emory Bellard’s first season as the coach. In 1980, with Bond running Bellard’s Wishbone offense, the Bulldogs won nine games, including a historic 6-3 victory over Bear Bryant’s No. 1 ranked Alabama Crimson Tide. Bond, who ran for more than 2,000 yards and passed for more than 4,000, remains the only State quarterback to defeat LSU four times.
Dave Clark
Clark, from the northeast Mississippi town of Shannon, was the 11th overall pick in the first round of the 1983 Major League draft. Clark, an outfielder, played 13 Major League seasons before embarking on a long coaching and managerial career in baseball. Currently a coach for the Houston Astros, he has managed, coached and won championships at the Minor League and Major League level.
Rod Davis
Davis won the C Spire Conerly Trophy, for Mississippi’s top college football player, in 2002 when he was the nation’s leading tackler for Southern Miss. He is the answer to an interesting trivia question: Eli Manning won the Conerly Trophy as a sophomore and a senior. Who won it Manning’s junior season? Davis, a three-time all-conference player at USM, is the school’s all-time leading tackler and was the Conference USA Defensive Player of the Year in 2003. The Gulfport native is currently the athletic director and head football coach at Florence.
Bianca Knight
Knight, a Pearl native, won Olympic gold, running a world record time in the 4×100-meter relay at the 2012 London Games. She was also a 2011 world champion in the same event. She won the 2008 NCAA indoor 200-meter championship, running for the Texas Longhorns after a remarkable high school career at Ridgeland High, where she captured 23 state championships.
Kris Mangum
Kris Mangum follows his older brother, John Mangum, into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. Mangum won All-SEC and All-American honors as an Ole Miss tight end and then played 10 seasons for the Carolina Panthers, excelling as a blocker and catching nine touchdown passes. He helped Carolina reach the 2004 Super Bowl. As a freshman in 1992, he helped Alabama to a national championship before transferring to Ole Miss, where he was a three-year starter and standout.
Seth Smith
Smith, a Jackson native, will be remembered as one of the greatest hitters in Ole Miss baseball history, who wasted no time making his presence known. He was the SEC Freshman of the Year, hitting .402, while also serving as the backup to football quarterback Eli Manning. In three seasons at Ole Miss, he recorded an on-base percentage of .410 and a slugging percentage of .473. He played 11 Major League seasons with five ball clubs and hit 126 home runs. In 2007, he helped the Colorado Rockies reach the World Series.
LaToya Thomas
Thomas, a Greenville native, was a four-time All American and two-time SEC Player of the Year in women’s basketball at Mississippi State. She finished her State career with 2,981 points and an average of 23.8 points per game. Her jersey, No. 32, is retired and hangs in Humphrey Coliseum. She was selected first overall in the 2003 WNBA draft and played professionally in the WNBA for six seasons and internationally for 11 seasons.
Shirley Gibbs Walker
The basketball floor at Alcorn State was named in Gibbs Walker’s honor in 2015 after her 30-year coaching tenure that included 493 victories, 12 SWAC regular season championships, six SWAC Tournament titles and three NCAA Tournament bids. The Bude native was inducted into the SWAC Hall of Fame in 2010.
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