Lieberman, a True Original and First Woman Coach in the D League

When the farm team of the Dallas Mavericks was in a start-up this past year, co-owner Donnie Nelson was looking for ways to stand out in the Dallas/Frisco Texas market.  The Texas Legends began play in the NBDL this season in Frisco, a suburb of Dallas, about 30 miles north and previously known primarily as the home of the MLS Cup runner-up FC Dallas.

So, as Nelson was building his team he was also looking for ways to differentiate the Legends.  What better way to do that than hire a woman as your coach?  Who better to be that woman than a legend in the game and a woman who has never backed down from any basketball challenge, including playing with and against men, both in organized ball and, even more impressively, on the New York playgrounds?  Enter Nancy Lieberman,  Lieberman, a member of the Hall of Fame had a spectacular playing career, winning two national championships at Old Dominion, a silver medal at the Olympics and a professional championship. Playing with men?  Throughout the 80s she played on the Lakers'  and Jazz's summer league teams, played two years in the long defunct USBL and even toured with the Globetrotters for a time, playing on the Washington Generals and reliving in some ways her childhood at Harlem's Rucker Park.


When the WNBA rolled around, she played and coached in it.  Then, she went to work for ESPN, but when Donnie Nelson offered her a job coaching the Legends the lure was too strong to resist.  She took the job and by all accounts has been accepted for what she is - the coach of a team in the D League, albeit one who hugs her players and tells them that she loves them.

Here's an interview with Cheryl Miller where Nancy discusses coaching the Legends:






Cross-posted to SportsBiz.

Ralph Kaplowitz, Played in NBA's First Game, Dies

My condolences to the family of Ralph Kaplowitz, of blessed memory, who passed away on February 2 at his home in Queens. He was 89. Mr. Kaplowitz, a 6'2" guard out of NYU, when NYU was a college powerhouse, played for the New York Knicks and the Philadelphia Warriors. Mr. Kaplowitz took the court for the Knicks against the Toronto Huskies on November 1, 1946, at Maple Leaf Gardens in what is now recognized as the first NBA game ever played. At the time, the league was known as the Basketball Association of America. Kaplowitz was traded that season to the Warriors, who went on to win the championship, so he has the unique distinction of playing in the first game and winning the first championship.

In an interesting sidelight, that first Knick team was broken up - not because of huge salaries and lousy performance like the Knicks teams of recent vintage but because of anti-Semitism. As Kaplowitz's daughter recalls: "“My father often told us that the first Knicks team, which had other Jewish players on it, was broken up because fans, especially on the road, would often chant nasty things,” Barbara Kaplowitz said. “But my father was too self-confident a man to ever let stuff like that bother him."

Cross-posted from SportsBiz- The Business of Sports Illuminated