SantaFeToday.com Santa Fe’s Hometown News
By Arnie Leshin
I wrote plenty on the late Nick Pino, always had a good story to write, and he always acknowledged that no one wrote more on him than I did.
But after the former state record-holder in scoring and field goals passed away back in November from complications with diabetes, I had to write that unfortunate, sad article, my last one regarding him until now.
Except that now will also be a gratifying piece about him, one I’m happy to applaud after big Nick, who played at 6-foot-11, was named to the 2019 New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame.
He joins another long-time friend, Tom Manning, the current athletic director at St. Michael’s who was named to the 2020 New Mexico Activities Association Hall of Fame.
St. Michael’s is where Pino graduated from in 1963 set a then-one-game state record of 80 points scored up at El Ritohis senior year. It lasted one year after George Maes of Santa Cruz scored 81, but he still holds the state field goal record by making 26 of them the same season versus Espanola Valley, and he did have a state record 1,033 points in the 1962-63 season before Bryce Alford of Albuquerque La Cueva tallied 1,050 in 2013.
Many times he was honored at a halftime event of the state basketball championships at the University of New Mexico Pit, but this time he showed up to congratulate young Alford as he did when George Maes was honored back then at halftime in the Pit.
Getting back to the 80-pointer at El Rito, Pino had the second-best accomplishment in state annals when he tossed in 35 field goals that night, but his then record points did break the El Rito school mark of 64 set by Dennis Branch in 1957, and might remain forever.
Now, to the applause of his family, friends, former teammates, and people like Tom Manning, he has gained this prestigious honor. It was Manning who submitted Nick’s name to the New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame selection committee, and Manning will be inducted at a ceremony and luncheon on Thursday, March 12, 2020, around noon at the Albuquerque Marriott Pyramid Hotel.
The ring ceremony will take place the same day during the state basketball championships at halftime of the 6:30 p.m. game at UNM’s Dreamstyle Arena.
Manning has for 45 years been a staple in the educational system in New Mexico. A graduate of St. Michael’s in 1967, he earned his bachelor’s degree from New Mexico State University in 1973, and his master’s in 1981 from New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas.
Upon completion of college, Manning worked as a physical education teacher at Mesilla Park and Conlee Elementary in Las Cruces until 1979. Then he relocated back to his hometown of Santa Fe and has either been a coach, teacher or athletic director at three different schools that included DeVargas Middle School, Santa Fe High, and now in his present role at St. Michael’s since 2002.
He has a vast knowledge of sports, and he coached a variety of sports, including football, basketball, track and field, and golf, where he still serves a co-head coach of the boy’s golf program, while also his alma mater’s full-time athletic director.
Under his leadership there, the Horsemen have won 52 state championships, 111 district titles, and three New Mexico Activities Association Director’s Cups.
His oldest son, Dave, is presently the head trainer at his alma mater, Santa Fe High, where he was a starter in baseball, basketball and football when his dad was athletic director there, and he’s now a married man, as is his younger brother, Mark, who when his father became athletic director there, starred at quarterback and played baseball at St. Michael’s, and their sister, Lisa, who played on the volleyball team at Santa Fe High when her father was then the athletic director, is also married.
With all that her imitate family has accomplished, and with their collective busy schedules, Tom’s wife, Rose, has been a supporter all through these years, and also deserves recognition as a nice lady with patience.
It was her husband who put NIck Pino’s name in as a candidate for the Hall of Fame. He informed me of this as he headed to a meeting in Albuquerque. He was hopeful that Pino would make it in, and he was happily correct.
The last time i spoke with Nick was the day after his Kansas State alma mater, where he was recruited and then played under legendary head basketball coach Tex Winter, had upset undefeated 6th ranked Oklahoma in football. He said he watched the second half of the game and informed me that he was now on the way to the hospital for tests, and he hoped he’d make it to his 75th birthday. But on that Sunday, he succumbed in the afternoon to years of diabetes.
He was as fond of his years as a KS Wildcat as he was as a Horsemen at St. Michael’s. Despite a bad back and the need of a cane or something large enough to assist him, He often made it over to the school for a halftime football game event. He was largely recognized and always received plenty of applause.
A knee injury his senior season at Kansas State, which he called Little Manhattan and the Little Apple, damaged his try for a professional career, although he did get a tryout with the Los Angeles Lakers, and then settled into a career as an insurance broker.
But he never made a big deal about being named one day to something like the New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame. He was kind, he was modest, he never bragged, and it was fitting that he was recognized as a deserving member of of it.
