Nine voted to Jewish sports hall

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 1 (JTA) — Nine people from five countries have been elected to the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. The 1998 honorees include four Americans: Marv Levy, who coached the National Football League’s Buffalo Bills to four consecutive Super Bowls (1990-93); David Stern, commissioner of the National Basketball Association since 1984; Cpl. “Izzy” Schwartz, world flyweight boxing champion from 1927-29; and A.J. Liebling, celebrated author and the New Yorker’s magazine boxing writer from the 1930s to the 1950s. Also elected were Russia’s Vera Krepinka, winner of the 1960 Olympic long-jump gold medal; Okey Geffen, South Africa’s famed international rugby kicker; Istvan Barta, the goalie of Hungary’s Olympic championship water polo teams in the 1920s; Chagai Zamir, Israel’s handicapped volleyball star and the winner of nine Paralympics, World Cup and European Cup gold medals; and Gyorgy Szepesi-Friedlander, a Hungarian broadcasting icon. The International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame is located in Netanya, Israel, on the campus of the Wingate Institute.