RIVERSIDE — The residents of this city had little idea what awaited them when Stan Morrison arrived in town in 1999 to become UC Riverside’s athletic director.

And they probably didn’t have a clue how thoroughly he would throw himself into Riverside’s civic life after he stepped down at UCR in 2011.

Morrison will be honored Sunday night at the Morongo Casino, Resort and Spa when he is inducted into the California Sports Hall of Fame. He is part of an induction class that also includes former Raiders Cliff Branch and Tim Brown, former A’s manager Tony La Russa and former Lakers star Michael Cooper.

“Stunned,” he said when asked about his reaction. “And I don’t stun. You see the other names there? Are you kidding me? I feel like the Hunchback of Notre Dame at a posture clinic. Related Articles Hoornstra: Baseball awards voting deserves less numerical approach in 2020

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“This is obviously not based on my won-loss record.”

But Morrison, nominated for this honor by Bill Walton, qualifies as something of a Renaissance Man, as well as one who has seen a lot as a basketball player (for Pete Newell at Cal and then for Spain’s Real Madrid Baloncesto), as a coach (at Pacific, USC and San Jose State) and as an administrator (at UC Santa Barbara and UCR).

“I’ve known Coach Morrison forever,” Walton said in a 2016 interview before his speech at the Riverside Unified School District coaches’ clinic (in which Stan was his straight man).

“With Stan Morrison being such a force of nature, and what he has done to build the community, to create a culture, to develop the foundation and to move everything forward, he is a classic example of what it means to be a great Californian and a great American hero. I love that guy, and when he calls, the answer’s always yes.”

It is fair to say that Morrison, 78, is busier now, with more balls in the air in the community, than he was as a UCR administrator.

“That’s 100 percent accurate,” he said. “I’ve never been busier in my professional career … I’m a pretty organized guy, but I’ve never had a desk look like this.”

He is currently a senior vice president at Pacific Premier Bank, he is the chair of the athletics advisory board at La Sierra University, and by his own count he is involved with 28 non-profit organizations in Riverside.

He is a board member of The Arc Riverside County, an organization that serves adults with intellectual and other developmental disabilities, and of Olive Crest, which provides services and programs to help at-risk kids.

He is involved with the Susan G. Komen foundation in its fight against breast cancer; the Unforgettables Foundation, which assists parents who have had to bury a child; the Boy Scouts; the American Diabetes Association; the March of Dimes, the Make-A-Wish Foundation; Meals on Wheels; the Mission Inn Foundation; the Riverside Downtown Partnership; the Inside Downtown Economic Council, the Riverside T-NOW Committee to promote public transportation; the Riverside Sport Hall of Fame, the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association … undoubtedly, we’ve missed a few.

And if you need a master of ceremonies or a host for an event, Stan is your go-to guy. He’s been the auctioneer for the Riverside Police Foundation’s Golden Badge Awards and for the Riverside Soroptimist’s Valentine Dessert Auction.

“I was selling cakes for $500 and $600,” he said. “And they were spectacular cakes.”

In addition to hosting the RUSD coaches clinic, Morrison emceed the Riverside Sport Hall of Fame induction ceremony this year. He is mentoring students from UCR’s graduate school of business, helping out a young classical pianist to put together a recital, and, he said, “working hard for a specific young man who is going to be the next Andrea Bocelli.”

His tenure at UCR was sometimes controversial and often a struggle. The firing of popular men’s basketball coach John Masi in 2005 opened wounds among boosters that took a long time to heal. And midwifing the school’s move to Division I without the funds needed to really make it work tested his patience and personality on a regular basis.

His mantra on campus was “Braveheart is alive,” both a reference to the 1995 movie about Scottish warrior William Wallace and an exhortation to get back on your feet after being knocked down. He practiced what he preached.

When he arrived in Riverside in 1999, he probably didn’t anticipate that this would become his and wife Jessie’s hometown for good.

“Most people thought we were going to go back to Montecito” after he left UCR, Morrison said, noting that the home that they still own in that Santa Barbara County community survived the fire and floods that buffeted the area.

“I didn’t know I was going to be that deeply involved here, either. But when the time came to make that decision, I said, ‘These are the nicest people we’ve ever known.’ It’s a great city. There are struggles in a number of areas, but I’ve never been around so many people who care about quality-of-life issues as Riversiders do.”

If memory serves me correctly, it was Morrison years ago who said Riverside was either the biggest small town or the smallest big city in America. It fits him and he fits it, and he spends a lot of time and energy trying to make it better.

“I do what I do to help people I’ll never meet or see,” he said. “It’s that simple.”

Isn’t that a Hall of Fame attitude?

jalexander@scng.com

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