Gene Fountain, who teamed with Curtis Henry, Donald and Ronald Barber, Greg Bess and Dale Mock to form one of the best Bainbridge High School Bearcats basketball teams of the mid 1970s, was back in town this week.

Fountain, who was here to visit his mother, Wilma, played under the late highly successful Bearcats head coach Charles Bess. Fountain now lives in Nashville, Tenn.

He went on to play college basketball at Middle Georgia College in Cochran and Lane College in Jackson, Tenn.

He was at Middle Georgia at the same time as former Bearcat and major league baseball player Ernest Riles, who will be among the first class to be inducted into the Decatur County Sports Hall of Fame on Saturday, Feb. 26, at the Kirbo Center.

“Those were some great years we had with coach Bess,” Fountain said. “He taught us a lot about the value of hard work and good character that has helped us greatly in our adult lives.”

Fountain, who is in the landscaping business in Nashville, has two sons, 26-year-old Titus and 27-year-old Rodrick.