Greg Hansen's picks for Mount Rushmore of Arizona men's basketball | Greg Hansen

– The Cactus Comet (football's Art Luppino, 1950s)

– Jackrabbit Joe (football's Joe Hernandez, 1960s).

– Big Bird (basketball's Bob Elliott, 1970s).

– The Heat Seeking Missile (football's Chuck Cecil, 1980s).

– Mighty Mouse (basketball's Damon Stoudamire, 1990s).

– Two-Star Scoob (football's Scooby Wright, 2010s).

Why is this news today? As the Star continues its eight-part series of the UA's Mount Rushmore athletes and coaches, it seems odd that two of the most everlasting athletes in school history, Steve Kerr and Sean Elliott, did not acquire nicknames. Not Mr. Clutch, Not Mr. 3, nothing. Their work spoke for itself.

Two of my selections of the Mount Rushmore for UA men's basketball have something besides elite performances in common: They were underdogs. Let me explain, one by one:

– Sean Elliott: On page 4 of the Daily Star's sports section, Sept. 6, 1984, the headline said: "Cholla's Sean Elliott says he'll attend Arizona." Yes, page 4.

The page 1 stories in that edition were that Martina Navratilova reached the semifinals of the U.S. Open and that Franco Harris was going to sign with the Seattle Seahawks. There was a feature story on UA football running back David Adams and another page 1 story on ex-Wimbledon champion Roy Emerson agreeing to play in a Grand Masters event in Tucson in November. Elliott's signing was on page 4. Unreal.

Ellilott turned down offers from UTEP, San Diego State, NAU and ASU to play for his hometown school. Elliott was quoted as saying "I expect to get a little playing time next year." By 1989, he was the NCAA Player of the Year, a two-time consensus All-American and the Pac-10's career scoring leader.

– Steve Kerr: On page 3 of the Star's Aug. 30, 1983, sports section, a small headline said: "Arizona signs basketball guard." To that point, Kerr had not been offered a scholarship after his high school days. Kerr was so unheralded that the Star's lede sports page that day printed stories on former UA football player Mike Robinson being waived by the Cleveland Browns, Nebraska routing Penn State 44-6 in college footballs Kickoff Classic, a preview of the U.S. Open tennis championships and a column on Sports Illustrated ranking Arizona's football team No. 3.

Lute Olson had watched Kerr play in a USA Basketball Developmental camp in late July at Long Beach, Calif., where he got his first look at Kerr. "That's when I began to ask questions," said Olson.

Five years later, after the 1988 Final Four, Kerr was almost surely the most popular athlete in UA history, the NCAA's Most Courageous Player of the Year and a once-unknown low-level prospect who would go on to play or coach nine NBA championship teams.

– Damon Stoudamire: On April 5, 1991, Stoudamire told a Louisville TV station he was "learning toward signing with Louisville." But the night before letter-of-intent forms were to be signed, Olson and UA assistant coach Tony McAndrew flipped the Portland, Oregon, point guard. Stoudamire, who was probably 5-feet, 10-inches, had led Portland's Wilson High School to a 26-0 record and a state championship. His coach, Dick Beachell, told the Star: "Damon is the best high school basketball player I've ever seen in more than 20 years in this state. There is nothing he can't do. There is a fire inside you can't duplicate."

With the exception of nearby Oregon State, other Pac-10 schools didn't hotly pursue Stoudamire, who some viewed as "too small."

Stoudamire became a consensus All-American at Arizona in 1995, led the Wildcats to the '94 Final Four and became the NBA Rookie of the Year in 1996. His UA teams won exactly 100 games as he carried the torch left by the Bob Elliott and Kerr period.

– Bob Elliott: In retrospect, it's astonishing Arizona was able to recruit the 6-10 "Big Bird" out of Pioneer High School in the backyard of the Michigan Wolverines in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Elliott averaged 24 points and 20 rebounds as a senior in 1973, and had offers from Top 25 powers Maryland, Michigan, Virginia and Michigan State.

A 4.0 student, Elliott was a musician. He could play the piano, trumpet, guitar, flute and saxophone. Perhaps the recruiting derby switched from the hometown Wolverines to Arizona when UA coach Fred Snowden spent several in-home visits sitting with Elliott's father, Robert Sr., a professor and UM grad, spending hours sitting with Snowden listening to jazz music. Big Bird phoned Snowden on Mother's Day to tell him he wanted to be a Wildcat.

In his four UA seasons, Ellliott led the Wildcats to their first Elite Eight, first WAC championship and, more so, scored 2,131 points, then a UA record by 366 points. He remains No. 2 today in Arizona scoring history and remains the face of Arizona's rise as a basketball school in the 1970s.