Women’s basketball star Nancy Lieberman and three-time Indianapolis 500 champion Mauri Rose were among seven athletes and sportsmen and women elected to the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in Netanya, Israel. The 2007 selections were announced Dec. 1 by hall of fame chairs Alan Sherman of Potomac, Md., and R. Stephen Rubin of London.

Lieberman, a three-time All-American for Old Dominion University, led the Lady Monarchs to a 72-2 record and back-to-back national championships in 1979 and 1980. She was named to the United States national team at age 16 and was a star of the 1976 silver medal Olympic squad and the 1979 World Championships gold medal team. Following graduation, Lieberman was the first draft choice of the Dallas Diamonds of the Women’s Professional Basketball League. She was the third female elected to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., as well as a member of the first class group of inductees into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in Knoxville, Tenn.

Rose won the Indy 500 in 1941, 1945, and 1947; he also finished in the top five four other times. He was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1994 and Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1996. Rose also won acclaim for inventing a device that allowed amputees to drive a car.

Others 2007 inductees include:

• • Zsuzsa (Suzy) Kormoczy, winner of the 1958 French Open singles and the only Jewish woman to win a Grand Slam singles event. Kormoczy, a Hungarian, was ranked second in the world that year, winning eight of nine tournaments she entered and reaching the semifinals at Wimbledon. The following year, she was the French Open Singles runner-up. Kormoczy made her first appearance in the world’s Top Ten ranking in 1947 and made the list nine times over the next 14 years.
  
  
• Eduard Vinokurov, a Russian fencing champion, won team gold medals in the saber competition at the 1968 and 1976 Olympic Games and a silver medal in 1972. He was also a member of the Soviet gold medal teams that captured five consecutive World Championships (1967, ’69, ’71, ’73, and ’75).
  
  
• Matt Wells, world welterweight champion in 1914-15, scored a 20-round victory over Irish Tom McCormick to win the World, British, and Empire welterweight titles. He held the British amateur lightweight crown from 1905 to 1907 and represented his country at the 1908 Olympic Games. Harry Simmons and United States Olympic sprinter Sam Stoller received the IJSHOF’s 2007 Pillar of Achievement Award. Simmons was a pioneer in schedule-making for his role in preparing schedules for both the International League and Major League Baseball before the age of computers. In 1979, Simmons was named “King of Baseball” — a ceremonial title given annually to an individual who has made a major contribution to the game — at the sport’s annual winter meeting. He is also credited with securing the Montreal Expos franchise in 1968.

Stoller, along with Jewish teammate Marty Glickman, was removed from the 400-meter relays at the 1936 Olympic Games to appease Adolph Hitler; they were replaced by Ralph Metcalfe and Jesse Owens. The Americans won the event, but a rational explanation for excluding the only Jews on the U.S. track team was never offered. Stoller was also the American indoor 60- and 100-yard and 100-meter indoor champion.

Since 1979, more than 320 athletes and sportsmen and women representing 24 countries have been elected to the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, which is located on the campus of the Wingate Institute for Physical Education and Sport in Netanya.