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Fleet feet helped a 1970 Mac-Hi grad play with the big boys

Larry Spencer, a 1970 Mac-Hi grad, didn’t have much size, but used his speed to stand out in high school and college sports.

Jim Buchan
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin

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photos courtesy LARRY SPENCER

Larry Spencer playing on the Mac-Hi basketball team in 1968 (left), and with legendary Pendleton football coach Don Requa at the 1970 Shrine Game.

WALLA WALLA — As an athlete, Larry Spencer’s eyes were always a little bigger than his appetite. Or, to put it in his own words, “I always wanted to play with the big boys,” the 1970 Mac-Hi graduate explained during a recent telephone interview from his home in Chico, Calif. This despite the fact that he topped out at 5-foot-9 and about 155 pounds soaking wet as a high school senior. Physical prowess clearly was not Spencer’s forte as an athlete. Speed was. And even more than that, quickness. “I was blessed with some good speed, and very good quickness,” Spencer recalled. “I was capable of quick movements.” All of which led to an outstanding high school career in football, basketball and baseball, plus an occasional flirtation with track and field. As a football player, Spencer was a quarterback until midway through his junior year when a shoulder injury forced him to change positions. He became a running back and led the Intermountain Conference in rushing as a senior with “around 1,200 yards.” He was a pure point guard in basketball, and play making and defense were his specialties. “I have these little tiny hands,” he said, “and I was not a very good shooter.”
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