Six Inducted into MoCo Sports Hall; Shriver Earns First Lifetime Honor

Olympic champ Thea LaFond joins Oguchi Onyewu, Paul Rabil, Haley Skarupa, legendary coach Al Thomas, and NFL tight end Bob Windsor as 2025 inductees

Montgomery County Sports Hall of Famers Oguchi Onyewu (left), Thea LaFond (third from left) and Haley Skarupa (right) with Unsung Sports Heroes Award winners Brett Riley (second from right), Muhammad Arif Wali (center) and Caprina Pipion-Williams (second from left). / Brandy Simms

Earlier this year, the Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame enshrined six new members during a ceremony in Silver Spring, Maryland. 

Thea LaFond, Oguchi Onyewu, Paul Rabil, Haley Skarupa, Al Thomas and Bob Windsor were among the recipients honored at the Silver Spring Civic Building on May 4 for their outstanding achievements in the sports realm. 

At the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, France, LaFond, who graduated from John F. Kennedy High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, won a gold medal in the triple jump and became Dominica’s first-ever Olympic medalist.  

LaFond, a former special education teacher at her high school alma mater Kennedy, expressed gratitude for the prestigious honor. “I am a MoCo kid through and through,” said LaFond. “MoCo raised me and I am so honored to go down in history in this county that has given me so much.” 

Oguchi Onyewu, who graduated from Sherwood High School in Sandy Spring, Maryland, enjoyed a 15-year career playing professional soccer and spent ten years as a member of the United States men’s national team where he played in the 2006 and 2010 World Cups. 

Paul Rabil, a Montgomery County native who attended Watkins Mill High School in Montgomery Village, Maryland before transferring to DeMatha Catholic High School in Hyattsville, Maryland, was honored for his achievements in the sport of lacrosse. 

Rabil played collegiately at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore where he led the Blue Jays to a pair of NCAA championships in 2005 and 2007. He received various individual accolades including All-American honors all four years and set records for most goals, assists and points. In 2007, Rabil won the McLaughlin Award as the nation’s best midfielder. 

The Montgomery County native played professional lacrosse with the Boston Cannons and New York Lizards of Major League Lacrosse (MLL) before co-founding the Premier Lacrosse League (PLL) with his brother Mike. He was named the MLL Offensive Player of the Year in 2009, 2011 and 2012 and was named the league’s MVP in 2009 and 2011. He also won MLL championships in 2011 and 2015. 

Haley Skarupa, a graduate of Wootton High School in Rockville, Maryland, is an Olympic gold medal winner and member of three world championship teams in women’s ice hockey. She began her career with the Washington Pride before attending Boston College where she scored 244 points in 144 games and was a two-time finalist for the Kazmaier national player of the year award. She turned pro in 2016 and spent seven years in the National Women’s Hockey League and the Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association. Since her retirement in 2023, Skarupa has worked as a hockey ambassador for the NHL’s Washington Capitals and served as USA Hockey’s head scout for the women’s national team. 

Al Thomas was one of the most successful high school football coaches in Maryland history, leading three Montgomery County football programs to eight Maryland state championships including Seneca Valley High School, Damascus High School and Sherwood High School. 

In 1964, Thomas, a Johnstown, Pennsylvania native, accepted his first coaching job as an assistant at Gaithersburg High School under John Harvill. He spent a decade on Harvill’s staff before he was named the first head coach in Seneca Valley history. He guided the Germantown public school to five Maryland state championships and won two state championships at Damascus before guiding Sherwood to a state championship in his final season in 2008. 

Bob Windsor spent nine seasons in the NFL, playing tight end for the San Francisco 49ers and the New England Patriots. 

The Washington, D.C. native was a three-sport star at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland where he excelled in football, basketball and track. Windsor was the starting center on Blair’s undefeated state champion basketball team in 1961. 

Windsor, who began his college career at Montgomery College in Maryland before transferring to the University of Kentucky, was selected in the second round of the NFL Draft in 1966. 

Windsor had a five-year stint as the head coach at Paint Branch High School in Burtonsville, Maryland where he guided the Panthers’ football program to a 34-15 record and two playoff appearances during his tenure. 

The Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame presented its first “Lifetime Achievement Award” to President John F. Kennedy’s sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver who founded Special Olympics on the grounds of her Rockville home in 1962. 

The lifetime award honors people who have had a major impact on a sport, a sports organization or a movement that changed sports. 

“The Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame is intent on honoring all those who have contributed to the great sports history of our county, whether as athletes, coaches or those in roles that have enabled these people to succeed. Recognizing disabled athletes and their coaches, such as those who participate in Special Olympics, is part of our mission,” said MCSHF Board of Directors Chair Bob Milloy. “We have established a ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’ that each year will honor people who dedicate a large portion of their lives toward making sports an important part of other people’s lives. I cannot think of a better recipient of our first Lifetime Achievement Award than Eunice Kennedy Shriver.” 

Mark Shriver, Eunice Kennedy Shriver’s son, accepted the award on behalf of the Shriver family. 

“Our mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, was a pioneer in the worldwide struggle for rights and acceptance for people with intellectual disabilities,” said Mark Shriver. “In 1962, she first invited young people with intellectual disabilities to a summer day camp she hosted in her backyard, right here in Maryland. Known as ‘Camp Shriver,’ the initiative developed to become Special Olympics – the world’s largest sports movement for people with intellectual disabilities. On behalf of my siblings and myself, I will be honored to accept the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame at the birthplace of her vision for equality, equity and dignity for a community that had been marginalized for far too long.” 

Special Olympics has more than four million athletes and Unified Sports partners and one million coaches and volunteers in 200 countries. 

Special Olympics Maryland (SOMD) is a year-round sports organization dedicated to providing sports training and competition opportunities to more than 25,000 athletes and Unified teammates with intellectual disabilities and/or closely related development disabilities.  

“Eunice Kennedy Shriver’s induction into the Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame is a well-deserved tribute to her vision of using sports to transform lives and promote inclusion through Special Olympics. A fierce competitor and advocate, she fought to ensure dignity and respect for individuals with intellectual disabilities,” said Jim Schmutz, President and CEO of Special Olympics Maryland. “Montgomery County, the birthplace of Special Olympics, played a key role in her mission. At Timberlawn in Rockville, she hosted camps showcasing the abilities of individuals with intellectual disabilities, laying the foundation for a global movement. Today, Special Olympics remains deeply rooted in community programs like Special Olympics Montgomery County, where over 500 athletes thrive – an enduring legacy of Mrs. Shriver’s impact.” 

UNSUNG SPORTS HEROES AWARDS 

The Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame has partnered with the Montgomery County Sports Advisory Committee to honor individuals and organizations that have made a meaningful impact in expanding athletic opportunities for Montgomery County residents. The first honorees are Brett Riley, Muhammad Arif Wali and Caprina Pipion-Williams. 

MONTGOMERY COUNTY SPORTS HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES 

Class of 2019 

Dominique Dawes 

Katie Ledecky 

Bob Milloy 

Bruce Murray  

Shawn Springs 

Walter “Big Train” Johnson 

Class of 2020 

Tom Brown 

Johnny Holliday 

Jeri Ingram 

Roy Lester 

Curtis Pride 

Amy Wood 

Class of 2021 

Richie Anderson 

Deane Beman 

Mike Curtis 

Charlene Thomas-Swinson 

Greivis Vasquez 

Class of 2022 

Rob Bordley 

Steve Francis 

Sally Glynn Hauser 

Sonny Jackson 

Tim Kurkjian 

Clarence “Pint” Israel 

Class of 2023 

Jim Fegan 

John Harvill 

Tracy Jackson 

Joanna Lohman 

Harold Solomon 

Scott Van Pelt 

NOTE: No induction was held in 2024. 

Nominations are now open for the Montgomery County Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2026 at www.mcshf.org