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Tuesday, September 02, 2025
George Raveling: Pioneering Basketball Coach
George Raveling--who starred as a player at Villanova before successful coaching stints at Washington State, Iowa, and USC--passed away yesterday at the age of 88. Raveling was inducted in the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2013, the same year that he received the John W. Bunn Lifetime Achievement Award from the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame (the Hall's highest honor other than induction). Raveling was inducted in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a Contributor in 2015. After Raveling passed away, Michael Jordan issued this statement: "For more than 40
years, he blessed my life with wisdom, encouragement, and friendship. He
was a mentor in every sense and I'll always carry deep gratitude for
his guidance. I signed with Nike because of George, and without him,
there would be no Air Jordan."
Raveling led Villanova to NIT appearances in 1959 and 1960, and he was selected by the Philadelphia Warriors in the 1960 NBA Draft but he did not play in the NBA. Instead, Raveling became an assistant coach at Villanova. Raveling not only provided security at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s
famous "I Have a Dream Speech" in 1963, but after Dr. King delivered the speech
he gave a printed copy of the speech to Raveling. Raveling donated the
copy to Villanova in 2021.
Raveling joined Lefty Driesell's staff at Maryland in 1969, thus becoming the first Black coach in the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC).
In 1972, Washington State hired Raveling as head coach, and he became the first Black coach in the Pacific-8 (Pac-8) Conference (the conference is now the Pac-12). Raveling guided the Cougars to the NCAA tournament in 1980, the school's first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1941. He was the UPI Pac-8 Coach of the Year in 1976, the Pac-8 Coach of the Year in 1976 (shared) and 1983, and the runner-up for the AP's national Coach of the Year award in 1983.
Raveling then moved on to Iowa, leading the Hawkeyes to a pair of NCAA Tournament berths (1985, 1986). He was an assistant coach to Bobby Knight for the 1984 Team USA squad that won Olympic gold, and he was an assistant coach to John Thompson for the 1988 Team USA squad that won Olympic bronze (the last time Team USA was comprised entirely of college players).
Raveling coached USC from 1986-1994, winning the Kodak National Coach of the Year award (1992), the Basketball Weekly Coach of the Year award (1992), and the CBS/Chevrolet National Coach of the Year award (1994). On September 25, 1994, his jeep was blindsided in a collision, and Raveling suffered nine broken ribs, a fractured pelvis, a fractured clavicle, and a collapsed lung. He was just 57 years old, but he retired from coaching to focus on his lengthy rehabilitation program. Raveling finished with a 335-293 career record in 22 seasons, including six NCAA Tournament appearances and five 20-win seasons. He had a losing record in his first season at each of the three schools that he coached, and he had a winning record in his last season at each of those three schools.
After he returned to health, Raveling worked as a basketball analyst for CBS and Fox Sports, served as the Director for International Basketball for Nike, and authored several books. His most recent book (published in 2025), What You're Made For, distills a lifetime of wisdom into chapters such as "To Be a Trailblazer" and "To Serve Others." Raveling's 2013 conversation/interview with Hubie Brown is a master class of basketball--and life--wisdom, and is essential viewing.
Raveling posted the conversation in 11 parts on YouTube. Here are the links, plus notes about each part:
Part 1:
Raveling concluded his introduction by declaring that Brown is regarded by acclamation as the greatest clinician in basketball history.
Brown recalled that when he was an assistant coach for Larry Costello with the Milwaukee Bucks, Costello had 11 different sets just to get the ball to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. "It was a mind-blowing experience" for Brown to learn Costello's offensive philosophies. Brown said that he developed the concise way of speaking that is a trademark of his broadcasting style from his experiences teaching at the Five-Star Basketball Camp when he made a conscious effort to be mindful that a coach/teacher must be aware of the attention spans of players/students.
Part 2:
Brown reminisced about his playing career at Niagara, and about his interactions with Larry Costello and Frank Layden, who later became successful NBA head coaches. Brown said, "I owe everything to Larry Costello," who hired Brown to be an assistant coach with the Milwaukee Bucks, thus giving Brown his first opportunity to coach in the professional ranks.Layden was Brown's teammate/roommate at Niagara, and later served as one of Brown's assistant coaches with the Atlanta Hawks.
Part 3:
Brown recalled becoming a high school basketball coach, and realizing that his future would be in basketball, not baseball. Brown also discussed playing basketball for the Army's team, and playing basketball in the Eastern Basketball League, which at that time was stacked with NBA-caliber players who had been banned from the NBA because of their actual or presumed associations with point shaving/fixing games.
Part 4:
Brown discussed his experience coaching baseball, basketball, and football at the high school level.He said that coaching high school sports for about $17,000 a year was the happiest time of his life--but it is evident that he also wanted to make his mark at higher levels, and so he took a pay cut to $7000 a year to take his first college job at William & Mary before going to Duke as an assistant coach to Vic Bubas.
Brown talked with reverence about Al LoBalbo, who mentored him and many other coaches. Brown described LoBalbo as "the ultimate clinician," the progenitor of the "Ball-You-Man" defensive concept utilized by Bobby Knight and many other Hall of Fame coaches, and the biggest single influence on his life other than his father. Brown said that one great piece of advice that LoBalbo gave him was to never use a whistle as a coach, but to command attention and respect with his voice alone.
Part 5:
Brown talked about his experiences working at Five-Star Basketball Camp, and some of the greatest players from that camp who made it to the NBA--and some of the greatest players from that camp who got sidetracked and did not make it to the NBA. Brown recalled that he used to tell the campers that the coaches are not impressed by how great they may think that they are, because the coaches have already seen Moses Malone, Isiah Thomas, Michael Jordan, and many other future Hall of Famers, plus other highly talented players who went the wrong way due to drugs, alcohol, or having a bad attitude. Brown told the campers that they have to choose which way they are going in life.
Brown said that when he coached high school basketball he insisted that his players participate in other sports as well, for two reasons: 1) He wanted them to benefit from the wisdom of the other coaches; 2) he felt that playing multiple sports provided the maximum opportunity for players to earn college scholarships and thus get a free education. Brown cited a specific example of one of his high school basketball players who ended up getting a football scholarship after first balking at the notion of playing any sport other than basketball. Brown added that his personal experience was that baseball was his first love, and if he had been limited to just playing baseball then he would have never had the career in basketball that he had.
Part 6:
Brown talked about serving as an assistant coach along with Chuck Daly on Vic Bubas' coaching staff at Duke. Raveling noted that this is perhaps the only time that one college coaching staff had two future Hall of Famers serving as assistant coaches. Brown called Bubas "the most organized man that I've ever met in my lifetime." Brown said that Daly's mantra was "Shooting makes up for a multitude of sins." At that time, Duke struggled to recruit the elite athletes, and thus focused on recruiting players who were great shooters.
Brown noted that after working alongside Daly he made a point each time he coached a team to have one player who was a pure shooter who could not run, jump, or play defense, because it is possible to "hide" one such player but it is not possible to "hide" two of them on the court at the same time.
Brown did not receive any college head coaching offers during his time at Duke, and he was seriously considering going back to New Jersey to coach high school sports before he received a call from Larry Costello, who hired Brown to be an assistant coach with the Milwaukee Bucks at $20,000 for the first year and $22,000 for the second year. What impressed Brown the most about coaching in the NBA was how hard the team's two best players worked: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Oscar Robertson set a high standard of professionalism that everyone else then followed. Brown also praised Bob Dandridge as "one of the greatest small forwards to play the game at both ends of the floor." Brown said that after his tenure in Milwaukee, every time he became a head coach the first thing he did was gather his players around, tell them how hard Abdul-Jabbar and Robertson worked, and emphasize that the players can either do things the right way by working hard or else they can leave: "We will never fine you. You will always fine yourself for your lack of professionalism. I've been with two of the greatest ever. They worked, and you're going to work." Brown said that a coach has to set the tone early, and make the expectations clear.
Part 7:
Brown described taking his first head coaching job in the professional ranks, signing a three year deal with the ABA's Kentucky Colonels in 1974 for $45,000 the first year, $50,000 the second year, and $55,000 the third year. He said that his 1974-75 Kentucky team--featuring Hall of Famers Artis Gilmore, Dan Issel, and Louie Dampier--was by far the best team he ever coached. The 1975 Colonels won the ABA championship, storming through the playoffs with a 12-3 record.
Part 8:
After the Colonels were not part of the 1976 ABA-NBA merger, Brown became coach of the Atlanta Hawks. The legendary Ted Turner bought the team. Turner also owned the fledgling TBS network, and the Atlanta Braves. The Hawks had suffered three straight losing seasons, and they went 31-51 in Brown's first year with the team. Turner met with Brown after the season, told Brown that the payroll for the players would be cut from $1,400,000 to $800,000, and the team would be the worst team in the league for the next two years so that they could get the number one overall draft pick twice (this was before the NBA instituted the Draft Lottery). Brown described how Turner told him all of this while pacing back and forth in his gigantic office tossing a pen in the air that he kept dropping instead of catching! After Turner finished outlining his plan, he asked Brown, "What do you think?"
Brown replied, "How about if we try winning?" A stunned Turner asks Brown how the team would win on an $800,000 budget if the team lost on a $1,400,000 budget. Brown said that he needed to have total control of which players they brought into camp, and that the team would use a variety of full court presses based on the game situation. Brown led the Hawks to the playoffs with a 41-41 record, and in the next two seasons the Hawks went 46-36 and 50-32, winning the 1980 Central Division title. During that period Brown and his scouts scoured the country for overlooked players, and found gems such as Charlie Criss, a 29 year old 5-8 guard who had been playing in the CBA (the successor to the Eastern League, Brown's old stomping grounds) and with the Washington Generals.
Brown said that Turner did not know anything about basketball, but he gave Turner credit for not interfering with the way that he picked the players and coached the team.
Part 9:
Brown shared more memories about coaching the Hawks under Ted Turner, including the time when Turner offered Brown the opportunity to be the Atlanta Braves' manager! Brown thought that the idea was ludicrous, but he asked Turner what Turner planned to pay him to coach the Hawks and manage the Braves at the same time. Turner exclaimed that he would not pay Brown anything extra because if Brown did this he would be in the Basketball Hall of Fame and the Baseball Hall of Fame. At that point, Brown told Turner that they could not talk about this any more.
Part 10:
Brown coached the Hawks until 1981. Next, he became a color commentator for USA Network, which broadcast NBA doubleheaders (much like TNT has been doing for the past several decades). Brown then spent five years coaching the New York Knicks before enjoying a long career as a broadcaster first with CBS and then with TNT. Brown's New York teams were injury-riddled, but they reached the playoffs in 1983 (losing to the eventual champion Philadelphia 76ers) and 1984 (losing to the eventual champion Boston Celtics).
After TNT went under different management and reduced Brown's broadcasting role, Brown accepted an offer from Jerry West to return to NBA coaching in 2002 at the age of 69. Brown spent three seasons coaching the Memphis Grizzlies. Brown led Memphis to a 50-32 record in 2003-04, earning his second NBA Coach of the Year award (he won his first in 1978 with the Hawks).
Part 11:
Brown talked about being inducted in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Brown said that he was "shocked" and felt humbled when he was first told that he would be honored. During the months after the April announcement until the enshinement ceremony, Brown reflected on his life and all the people who had helped him along the way, and tried to figure out how to include all of that into his speech. Here is Brown's Hall of Fame enshrinement speech:
Raveling concluded by asking Brown how he wants to be remembered. Here is Brown's reply:
"I always wanted to be referred to as a teacher. I wanted to be a person that you would think of as being organized and never cheated--whether it was 55 minutes of business law in the classroom, or whether it was a two hour practice, an hour and a half practice, a three hour practice, that we never cheated you in your time. I wanted them to always think that even though you might not like the approach, but that we tried to get them to reach their potential. If they would just think of me in that light, I would be very happy because basketball has taken me and my wife around the world. Basketball changed me from being a corner guy hanging out to having a major future. And then, through the clinics, and in the world clinics, and then when Jack Ramsay and I and Calvin Murphy and [Bill] Walton went to 25 countries for the NBA, we had a chance to affect a lot of FIBA national basketball teams...As we both know, it's no different than any other business that you're in: you've got to prepare, you never underestimate the audience, you never underestimate their IQ and how much they want. So you never talk down. You talk to them. What you're hoping for is for them to raise their game IQ-wise by your mistakes, by mistakes that you've made. And don't be afraid to tell them about your mistakes...I know a lot of people say Hubie's so intense, but that's why I go always back to those two guys, my Dad and Al LoBalbo." Brown paused for a moment and became teary-eyed before concluding, "They forced you to pursue excellence, and to never cheat the people that you're responsible for. That's what you're hoping for."
"A work of art contains its verification in itself: artificial, strained concepts do not withstand the test of being turned into images; they fall to pieces, turn out to be sickly and pale, convince no one. Works which draw on truth and present it to us in live and concentrated form grip us, compellingly involve us, and no one ever, not even ages hence, will come forth to refute them."--Alexander Solzhenitsyn (Nobel Lecture)
"The most 'popular,' the most 'successful' writers among us (for a brief period, at least) are, 99 times out of a hundred, persons of mere effrontery--in a word, busy-bodies, toadies, quacks."--Edgar Allan Poe
"In chess what counts is what you know, not whom you know. It's the way life is supposed to be, democratic and just."--Grandmaster Larry Evans
"It's not nuclear physics. You always remember that. But if you write about sports long enough, you're constantly coming back to the point that something buoys people; something makes you feel better for having been there. Something of value is at work there...Something is hallowed here. I think that something is excellence."--Tom Callahan
