Sad story about Bjorn Nittmo

[Apptiger]

Wow! I had no idea. Very sad to hear.

I knew him well while at App as I was there at the same time. Great guy and a real sense of humor. A rock steady kicker for us with a booming leg. I believe he was the reason we started playing buglers dream on kick offs if I'm not mistaken.

Very sad read. I think he was the best kicker we ever had and we've had our share. Very sad.

BTW..."Buggler's Dream was started to make some members of the soccer team feel welcome and supported in Boone. We had members from the Nigerian national soccer team enrolled and playing. They didn't get to play in the '76 Olympics because of a boycott due to Russian politics. Members of the pep band showed up one night and played it when they took the field. Let's just say it caught on.....

Thompson Usyian, Emanuel Igbekka. Kingsley Essabeman, Keith Layne.....I am forgetting a lot of them sadly and the spelling is probably wrong. They taught us how to play soccer and we taught them how to play basketball. Tommy loved basketball in Broome -Kirk and got quite good very quickly. He even taught me how to bend a corner kick in the goal. I think we were ranked in the top ten their entire time at ASU. Tommy had a pro soccer career and still holds some NCAA scoring records. Last I heard Eman was running a charitable foundation back home in Nigeria. Mr. Black Saturday can verify the story......

[GOAPPS37]

Michael Sanazu

[85gradinATL]

App Tiger - Thanks for the note about Bugler's Dream. I always wondered about that. It seems one of the few long-time and "Original" App football things. It was played when I was here (81-84 fb seasons). I posted in another thread about the Olympics that the guy who wrote that moved to Yadkin County from France to retire and is buried there. I didn't know if he had done something at App and that was kind of a tribute to him. Most of those Nigerian players left when Hank Steinbrecher left App. I was a freshman Art Rex's first year and when Clemson came here to play us after we beat them in the NCAA tournament. Steinbrecher's son is the commissioner of the MAC in case you need more, it's a small world stuff. I worked in the sports media in Birmingham in the 90s and Hank came to Birmingham because they hosted Olympic Soccer. He was the chairman of US Soccer at the time and I called him coach. He laughed and said he hadn't been called that in a long time. I told him he would always be coach to me and those who remember him at App.