When the Saint Louis men’s basketball team went from 5-23, to 12-17, to 23-6, Billiken fans wondered what caused the drastic turnaround. As time went on, the answer proved to be the arrival of new head coach, Charlie Spoonhour, in 1992.

Not only did Spoonhour lead the team to an overall record of 122-90, three NCAA tournament appearances, and their first national ranking in 37 years, but he also made a significant impact on the Saint Louis community off the court. He was remembered to have a magnetic personality, witty charm, and a deep love for the St. Louis Cardinals.

As a result of the excitement that Spoonhour brought to Saint Louis University, the 1997-98 men’s basketball team became ranked in the top ten in attendance, with around 18,000 fans per game, for several seasons.

“He just had a way of connecting with people better than anyone I’ve ever been around. The wins and losses were great. But it was more the human being. He just drew people to him,” said Scott Highmark, former SLU basketball player under Charlie Spoonhour.

As Highmark stated, as much success as Coach Spoon brought to the team, winning games was not the end all be all. Because of his genuine care for the players, he was able to transform the culture from negative to positive with an emphasis on simply having fun, an aspect that many high level coaches push to the side.

The high energy, fast-paced, trigger happy playing style of the Saint Louis U team coined the term “Spoonball” among Billiken fans in the late 90s and remains a recognized phrase in the community.

After seven seasons at SLU, Spoonhour reportedly retired from coaching but quickly picked it back up again in Las Vegas, Nevada for three seasons at UNLV. However, in 2010, he was diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a scarring of the lungs, and received a lung transplant later that year at Duke University Medical Center. At the age of 72 in 2012, Charlie Spoonhour passed away.

Despite his death, Spoonhour’s legacy continued on, as he was honored as a Missouri Sports Legend by the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame on December 11, 2019.

“There’s just so many people that he impacted that are still in coaching today, and then there’s a lot of players like me that he impacted as a father, as a business owner, teaching me how to work, teaching me how to do things that I didn’t think I was capable of doing, and not actually knowing where my limits were,” said Highmark.