Your school's college bball Mt. Rushmore
- Thread starter jhmossy
- Start date
Any UL list without Wes Unseld on it is bogus.
Jumpin Johnny Green ....
https://msuspartans.com/news/2009/2/24/Johnny_Green_The_Ultimate_Walk_On.aspx
Saw him touch the top of the backboard in Memorial Coliseum. Amazing player...
He was definitely up for consideration, but those other 4 just did more. I’d have a Coach Jud Heathcote over Johnny Green, probably someone with the same last name, Draymond Green as well.
Johnny Green was great, but in the year we went to the Final Four in the 50’s he wasn’t on any all American teams and never actually made a first team.
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He was just a guy that truly amazed me with I saw him in Lexington. His life story would have made a great movie imo.
Top 3 are no brainers
Gary
Bias
Dixon
4th spot is up in the air. Could go Lefty, Joe Smith, John Lucas, Greivis, Elmore or McMillen. But my 4th spot is going to Walt Williams. Him staying with the sanctions helped Gary build the program. He might not have been the best player, but his importance to the program can’t be matched by most.
I watched Lonnie Baxter, Steve Blake, and of course Juan Dixon up close and in person, courtside on a couple different occasions down in Tallahassee. FSU was abysmal then, but I came just to see those guys. Fantastic teams. I consider myself lucky to get to watch them.
Everett Dean is close.. Only coach to be in the Naismith Basketball HOF, and College Baseball HOF. IU's first All-American.. There was no NCAAT during his time at IU. Odds are, he probably wuld have won one; He did win a title at Stanford in 1942.
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I almost put Hugh Durham for FSU too...but I went with Ham. Pretty impressive that a guy could legit be on two different program’s Mt. Rushmore.
Bro, you're going with Issel and Riley over Calipari and Pitino??
Issel wasn't even a NPOY nor did his UK teams ever win a title.
Come to think of it, I've never realized what a coach driven program UK is. Davis is your program's only true great player which makes your 8 national titles and other program accolades all the more impressive in my opinion.
Only true great player? Are you kidding me? I’m not even a UK fan, hell im a UK hater but they’ve had plenty of great players. Just in my lifetime mashburn, delk, Mercer, Meeks, Patterson, Wall, Cousins, KAT, Booker, Fox, Adebayo were all great players.m and I know I missed a few as well like Ullis. And that doesn’t include players like Issel and Riley and Bowie who played before I was old enough to closely follow cbb. I mean I guess we could split hairs on our definition of great, and AD is probably the best of the bunch, but imo their have been many great players play for UK. Even ones that didn’t have exceptional NBA careers were still great in college.
But going by your criteria I’d say a lot of programs have never had a “truly great” player. I guess if your going by NBA and HOF status/potential, maybe, but that’s a pretty high bar to set. That would be like saying Magic is the only truly great player to come thru MSU, or Jordan at UNC, or Isiah Thomas at IU.
Which I’m not trying to downplay all the different coaches that have won a natty at UK or the programs overall accomplishments, I just believe they’ve had many more great players than AD, esp if we are talking about their college careers.
LMFAO did you just bring up Meeks, Pat Pat and Booker??? Dude we're talking about some of the best players ever to play college basketball; you're embarrassing Kentucky by bringing up these names. We're talking about guys like MJ, Hansbrough, Laettner, Battier and Redick here. Nobody at UK besides AD can match these names I'm sorry.
I don't know how you got insulted by my comment. I said that I was impressed that UK never had to rely on any truly great college bball players outside of AD and Issel to win their 8 titles and have all that team success.
Patterson isn't a terrible choice. Top 15 in points and rebounds in UK history in 3 seasons (plus he made Coach K cry). The rest, no, especially not Booker.
I wasn’t insulted at all, I’m not even a UK fan, I just don’t think AD is the only great player to ever play for UK. You didn’t mention issel the first time, just AD. And I wasn’t trying to downplay the coaches accomplishments either I just feel like imo there have been many more great players play for UK than Davis. And I listed a bunch of one and dones and players that stayed 3-4 years bc I couldn’t tell if ur criteria for greatness was based off college career or overall basketball career.
College careers, yea i can get behind what ur saying bc th one and dones didn’t have multiple years in college to rack up accolades. But if we are talking just great basketball players including their nba careers/career paths then imo KAT>Laettner, bam > hansborough, booker>Reddick. But if your just looking at college careers and accolades then yes I can understand your point, those guys don’t stack up, and they are not even close. But it’s not bc they weren’t/aren’t great players, but bc they only played in college for a year.
I wasn’t sure if you were going strictly college careers or overall basketball careers bc even AD, who had one of the best years ever for a college player as far POY/Naismith and natty, his college career still probly wouldnt stack up to the careers of the guys you mentioned bc he wouldn’t have as many accolades or better career numbers, bc he too only played one year in college. But there is no denying how great he was/is )now or his one year in college)
Imo it’s Just hard to compare players across eras imo when now a days the best players only stay one year and don’t have lofty career numbers.
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IU has 3 NBA hall of fame players, Walt Bellamy, George McGinnis, and Isiah Thomas.
Duke never had a player as good as Dan Issel.Bro, you're going with Issel and Riley over Calipari and Pitino??
Issel wasn't even a NPOY nor did his UK teams ever win a title.
Come to think of it, I've never realized what a coach driven program UK is. Davis is your program's only true great player which makes your 8 national titles and other program accolades all the more impressive in my opinion.
You apparently never saw him play.
Schoonerwest, you can laugh all you damned well please but you can not name a Duke player that was better than Dan Issel.
Name him.
Issel still leads Kentucky in scoring and he did it in three years (2,138 points in 83 games for 25.8 points per game). Lead rebounding. All American.
Put up or shut up.
Christian Laettner?
All-American awards
21-2 record in the NCAA tournament
NCAA MOP
NCAA POY
I really shouldn’t have to list his accomplishments. He’s widely regarded as a top 5-10 player in the sports history. Dan Issel is not.
He scored a little more than half the points and a fraction of the rebounds that Issel did.
If Issel had won three NCAA tiltes at UK his total NCAA games would have been 15.
Dan Issel did better in the pros than Laettner.
Sorry you are wrong.
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But Issel didn't win 3 titles at Kentucky. He won 0. He never even played in a Final Four. Laettner played in 4 of them. Laettner was also the best player on 2 different teams that won a title.
Stats are great and all but would you rather have a guy like Issel score 30+ PPG with no postseason success or have a guy who scores half of that but leads you to multiple titles?
Sorry, Issel was a fantastic player but he was not better than Christian Laettner. He's closer to JJ Redick than he is to Laettner. You are wrong here and any non-biased fan would agree with me.
I’m a UCLA fan. Honestly tho, Oscar Robertson is probably the best ever in College. 35 ppg, 15 rpg, and 7 assists pg.
Though Lynn Shackelford did say Kareem could have averaged 50 ppg, if that had been the game plan.
IMO Kareem, Issel, Gilmore, Hayes, Chamberlain, Russell, were the best bigs.
Bull shit. Laettner could not stay on the court with Issel.
Different times, but Issel was the better talent.
I agree.
At Louisville Issel and Gilmore were on the same team.
Chamberlain was a work of fiction. Real people could not do what he did. Russell was also the same.
Oscar Robertson was also fiction. I watched him do shit that a human should not be allowed to do. Also Julius Erving was a work of art. He and Michael passed up basketball.
Thank you Crappy Davenpot for your input. Anymore, reason and experience is hard to find on this board.
I am not old enough to have seen the Big O play, but I have heard and read about his greatness. I have met him several times and had his Cincinnati Royals jersey in high school. SmokinSmile
You would watch the Big O and think he was normal.
Then he would do something impossible and then you would think he was wonderful.
Then you watch him and he is normal, and then he did impossible crap again.
Even on a bad night you left wondering how he did it.
Basketball is a team sport though, and obviously Issel didn't have the horses around him that Laettner did. It's easy to say so-and-so was better than someone that you never saw play.
Thanks Bert. The thought of Chamberlain shooting free throws by standing at the top of the circle, throwing the ball toward the hoop, taking 2 huge steps, and dunking the ball...sheesh what a freak. The NCAA got wind he was doing this during preseason practices at KU. They quickly changed the free throw rule so you could not cross the FT line. Lol, holy smokes! Hey Artis Gilmore played for Jacksonville U. Highest rebound average for a career, 23+ I think.
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