It began more than 40 years ago, when he grew so much as a ninth-grader at San Jose Junior High in Novato, his mother often complained about having to buy new pants. Fortunately, DeLoatch’s basketball shorts were always big enough for his glory days at Novato High from 1975-1977, when he set a MCAL scoring record for a three-year career (782 points) that still stands today. DeLoatch credits two things: A rivalry with high-scoring Walt Gillespie of Drake and the legalizing of the dunk his senior year.
“He was my favorite,” DeLoatch said of Gillespie, who was one year older. “We wound up playing on the same summer league team. We won the championship.” DeLoatch, who stands 6-foot-6, went on to play on nationally ranked USF teams in the Bill Cartwright era.
“When I wasn’t playing, I would never watch the game,” said Deloatch, who was a high school All-American Honorable Mention in 1977 after averaging 25.5 points and 13.8 rebounds in leading the Hornets to a 25-6 record and the MCAL Championship his senior year. “I would always look at the coach and wonder when was he going to let me into the game. I’d say (to myself), ‘I’m an All-American. Put me in. I’m better than these guys.’ But it didn’t happen very often.”
So Deloatch moved on to UC Riverside, which he labeled “a total nightmare,” and subsequently had to turn down invitations to play professionally in Argentina and Brazil because of a pair of surgeries.
“For a while, I couldn’t even watch basketball,” he said. But now, Now he does a comedy act, often performing at former rival Mike Ghiringhelli’s restaurant in Novato. He was inducted in the Marin Athletic Hall of Fame in 2018 (MarinIndependentJournal).
