NBA champion, HBCU legend enshrined in Hall of Fame

Former HBCU basketball star and New York Knicks NBA championship member Dick Barnett finally got basketball’s top honor over the weekend.

Legendary Tennessee State basketball star Richard “Dick” Barnett was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame class on Saturday as an individual player. He was already inducted previously as part of the Tennessee A&I squad that won three consecutive NAIA titles in the late 1950s. 

Barnett started his NBA career with the Syracuse Nationals and spent a few seasons with the Los Angeles Lakers, but he is best remembered as a member of the New York Knicks programs that won NBA titles in 1970 and 1973.

Prior to that, though, Barnett was a kid in Gary, IN who developed a love for the game of basketball. In his career retrospective, he recalled going outside in the winter with his gloves and a shovel to clear a path to the basket. 

“I paid the price for thousands and thousands of hours (of playing basketball),” Barnett said. “Rain, sleet and snow was part of the toll.”

Barnett went on to become a star basketball player on a legendary squad at Rosevelt High School. He recalls showing up to the playground one day — a day that changed the course of his life.

“John McLendon came out, introduced himself and said ‘I’m John McLendon and Tennessee State,” Barnett said. “And I had never thought that I would be even considered, being a college student. And obviously, that whole relationship changed my life around completely.”

And the rest, as they say, is history. Barnett averaged 23.6 points per game during his college career for the groundbreaking HBCU squad.

After helping lead the program to glory he was drafted by the Syracuse Nationals (forerunner to the Philadelphia 76ers). He spent two seasons there before reuniting with McLendon for a season with the Cleveland Pipers of the American Basketball League. He returned to the NBA to team up with Jerry West and Elgin Baylor with the Lakers before being traded to the New York Knicks.

Barnett would be traded to the Knicks and team up with another HBCU legend in Willis Reed of Grambling State. He was selected to the 1968 NBA All-Star team with his trademark jumper and helped the team win its only two titles in franchise history to this point. 

The now 88-year-old averaged just 16 points per game for his career.

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