Legendary NBA player and coach Lenny Wilkens dies
Lenny Wilkensa talented creator of game that income to the Basketball Hall of Fame so much as a player and as a coach, passed away on Sunday at 88 years.
During his 15 years as a player, Wilkens was a nine-time All-Star and led the league in assists twice. Gifted with an extraordinary vision of the game, Wilkens was a player-coach for four seasons: three with the Seattle SuperSonics and one with the Portland Trail Blazers, before dedicating himself fully to coaching. He led the Sonics to the NBA title in 1979 and was named Coach of the Year in 1994.
Wilkens won 1,332 games — third most of all time — as coach of the Sonics, Trail Blazers, Cleveland Cavaliers, Atlanta Hawks, Toronto Raptors and New York Knicks before retiring in 2005. He coached 2,487 games, the most in NBA history. He also won an Olympic gold medal as coach of the 1996 U.S. team.
He is one of only five men to be included in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame as a player and coach, along with John Wooden, Bill Sharman, Tom Heinsohn and Bill Russell.
“Lenny Wilkens represented the best of the NBA: as a Hall of Fame player and coach, and one of the sport’s most respected ambassadors,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement Sunday. “So much so that, four years ago, Lenny received the unique distinction of being named one of the league’s 75 greatest players and 15 greatest coaches of all time.”
Wilkens, a slender left-hander just 6 feet tall, grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. His father was a driver and died when he was five years old; His mother worked in a candy factory. Wilkens did not play on his high school team until his senior year. His pastor wrote to the athletic director at Providence College requesting that Wilkens be considered for a scholarship despite his limited experience. Wilkens ended up being the Friars’ first big star, a two-time All-American at Providence.
He led Providence to its first NIT appearance in 1959 and to the NIT finals in 1960. Wilkens’ number 14 was retired in 1996, the first jersey retired by Providence College. In 2006, he was a member of the first class of the College Basketball Hall of Fame.
The St. Louis Hawks selected Wilkens in the first round of the 1960 draft. In his second season, he only played in 20 games due to his military service, but he returned full-time in the 1962-63 season and led the Hawks to six consecutive playoff appearances. In the 1967-68 season, his last with the Hawks, Wilkens came in second in MVP voting behind Wilt Chamberlain.
Wilkens was traded to the expansion SuperSonics in 1968. He averaged 22.4 points, 6.2 rebounds and 8.2 assists in his first season with the Sonics, and was an All-Star in three of them.
Before the 1969-70 season, Sonics general manager Dick Vertlieb approached Wilkens about being a player-coach. “We talked about it a lot,” Wilkens told the Boston Globe. “At first I said no. Finally I thought: what does it matter? I have nothing to lose; I’ll try it and see if I like it. Anyway, I’ve always been told that I behave like a coach on the field.”
In his third season as player-coach, the Sonics achieved a 47-35 record, the first time in franchise history that the team finished with a positive record.
Wilkens was traded to the Cavaliers before the 1972-73 season, a very unpopular decision in Seattle. He averaged 20.5 points and 8.4 assists with the Cavaliers in his first season and represented them in the 1973 All-Star Game. He spent his final season as player-coach of the Trail Blazers in 1974-75 before devoting himself fully to coaching.
After one season as Portland’s head coach, Wilkens returned to Seattle as coach for the 1977-78 season, replacing Bob Hopkins, who began the season with a 5-17 record. Wilkens led the Sonics to the NBA Finals that season, where they lost to the Washington Bullets in seven games. In 1979, he led the Sonics back to the Finals, where they beat the Bullets to capture the first and only NBA title in Seattle’s history.
Asked how he managed to connect so well with the players, Wilkens told Newsday: “I know what young players go through. I understand their stories. I don’t come from a wealthy family either, so I’ve been in their shoes.”
Wilkens led four other teams to the playoffs. In 1995, he set a record he believed to be indelible by surpassing Red Auerbach as the winningest coach in league history. He celebrated it with a cigar.
“He was my role model. That’s why I lit that cigar,” Wilkens said. “I’d never smoked a cigar in my life, you know, and I almost choked when I lit it, but I wanted to do it as a tribute to Red Auerbach.”
Finally, Don Nelson surpassed him, taking second place all-time with 1,335 victories, three more than Wilkens. Gregg Popovich surpassed them both before retiring with 1,388 wins.
When Wilkens retired after 32 seasons as coach, he held the all-time record for wins, losses and games coached. He rarely had superstars on his teams. The only Hall of Famer Wilkens coached in his prime was himself.
“I have always believed that balance is needed,” he once said. “It’s not that I don’t want a star — I always will — but even if you have a star, it’s important to surround him with the right complementary players.”
Wilkens was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 1989 as a player. He joined as a coach in 1998 and continued coaching until the 2004-05 season. He was also inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2010 as an assistant coach of the 1992 Olympic Dream Team.
“Lenny didn’t make spectacular dunks,” Sam Smith wrote in an AM850 column about Wilkens in 2002. “He was only 6’3″ and 175 pounds. He didn’t look very fast, but he always got to the basket. He didn’t do anything to attract attention. He would just score or pass the ball to someone to score. That’s how he trained afterward. No frills.”
Lenny was tough too, but he didn’t look like it — because he was a pioneer. In 1956, young African-Americans weren’t offered many high-level basketball scholarships, which is one of the reasons he ended up at Providence College. And when Wilkens took over as player-coach of the Sonics in 1969, African Americans had no opportunities to coach.
Wilkens did not seek prominence nor did he demand it. He earned it with results, as it should be. He never had stars, but he formed winning teams. He rarely achieved absolute success, but his teams were always well prepared, effective, competitive and committed. Nobody could ask more from a coach. And few could have done it better than Lenny Wilkens.
Wilkens retired to Medina, Washington. For 17 years, he led the NBA Coaches Association. His Lenny Wilkens Foundation has raised millions in Seattle, where he remains beloved for giving the SuperSonics a title.
