KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. – The Howard Morris Oregon Tech Athletic Hall of Fame welcomed four new individuals and a team into its fraternity on Saturday, as the school held the fifth-annual induction ceremonies.
 
Men's basketball All-American, Rafid Kiti, softball All-Americans Brenda (Ruppel) Mick and Leah (Azevedo) Jolly, longtime basketball assistant coach Mike Pisan, along with the 1997-98 men's basketball team, joined the exclusive club.
 
Kiti, the Hustlin' Owls first-ever first-team All-American, spoke of his long journey that started as a child in war-torn Iraq and ended in Klamath Falls, where he scored 1,399 career points in two seasons and earned Cascade Conference Player of the Year honors in 1994.
 
Both Mick and Azevedo spoke of the influence their fathers had on shaping their softball careers and how coaches Danny Miles, Mary Bradford and Bill Fagan were key in their success at Tech. Mick was a two-time All-American in 1997 and 1998 and is OIT's all-time ERA leader (0.94), while Azevedo was a first-team All-American in 2002, posting the current school record batting average of .500.
 
Pisan, a longtime assistant for Miles and a radio analyst alongside fellow Hall of Fame inductee, Bobby Thompson, was grateful for his wife pushing him back into the coaching ranks in 2001 after retiring as an administrator with the Klamath Falls City Schools. He was on the bench when Tech claimed the 2004, 2008 and 2012 NAIA titles.
 
Miles spoke at length about his 1997-98 team, which earned an at-large bid to the NAIA Tournament and won four games in five days to reach Tech's first-ever national title game, losing at the buzzer to Bethel (Ind.). Standout forward from the team, Matt Foster, talked about the great team chemistry the squad had, as 12 of the 13 players on the club were in attendance.
 
The Hall of Fame is named after its first inductee, legendary OIT coach and administrator, Howard Morris, who shaped Hustlin' Owl athletics during his three decades in the Basin.