Long-Time Fayetteville Coach Passes Away

Hall of Fame basketball coach Joe Kretschmar died Tuesday night after a four-month long battle with cancer.

The long-time Fayetteville High coach was diagnosed with cancer in June. He lettered in basketball at Arkansas in 1956 and coached at Fayetteville for 26 years, retiring in 1992 when he was replaced by former assistant Barry Gebhart.

"I went and saw him yesterday and he wasn't doing too good so I wasn't surprised when I heard he had passed," Gebhart said. "Fayetteville basketball started with him. Everything that we’ve done in my time frame here has been just kind of hitching our wagon to what we did.

Kretschmar was inducted into the Arkansas High School Coaches Association and the Arkansas Officials Association Hall of Fame in 2007. Feneral arrangements were still being finalized, but it's expected to be at either 1 p.m. or 2 p.m. on Saturday at Central United Methodist Church in Fayetteville.