The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame is an American history museum and hall of fame, located at 1000 Hall of Fame Avenue in Springfield, Massachusetts. It serves as basketball's most complete library, in addition to promoting and preserving the history of basketball. Dedicated to Canadian-American physician James Naismith, who invented the sport in Springfield, the Hall of Fame inducted its first class in 1959, before opening its first facility on February 17, 1968.
James Naismith was a Canadian-American physical educator, physician, Christian chaplain, and sports coach, best known as the inventor of the game of basketball. After moving to the United States, he wrote the original basketball rule book and founded the University of Kansas basketball program in 1898. Naismith lived to see basketball adopted as an Olympic demonstration sport in 1904 and as an official event at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, as well as the birth of the National Invitation Tournament (1938) and the NCAA Tournament (1939).
Christian Donald Laettner is an American former professional basketball player. His college career for the Duke Blue Devils is widely regarded as one of the best in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) history. He was the star player on the back-to-back Duke National Championship teams of 1991 and 1992, and the NCAA player of the year in his senior year. He is particularly famous for his game-winning shot against Kentucky in the 1992 tournament and for the hatred he received from opposing fans.
Forrest Clare "Phog" Allen, D.O. was an American basketball coach and physician. Known as the "Father of Basketball Coaching," he served as the head basketball coach at Baker University (1905–1908), the University of Kansas, Haskell Institute—now Haskell Indian Nations University (1908–1909), and Warrensburg Teachers College—now the University of Central Missouri (1912–1919), compiling a career college basketball record of 746–264. In his 39 seasons at the helm of the Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball program, his teams won 24 conference championships and three national titles.
Clyde Edward Lovellette was an American professional basketball player. Lovellette was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1988. He was the first basketball player in history to play on an NCAA championship team, Olympics gold medal basketball team, and NBA championship squad.
W. Harold Anderson was an American college men's basketball coach at Bowling Green State University and the University of Toledo. As a player, he played at Otterbein College, a small liberal arts college outside Columbus, Ohio. As a coach he was one of the first to win more than 500 games on the collegiate level. Anderson was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 1985 and the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006.
John B. McLendon Jr. was an American basketball coach who is recognized as the first African American basketball coach at a predominantly white university and the first African American head coach in any professional sport. He was a major contributor to the development of modern basketball and coached on both the college and professional levels during his career. He has been enshrined three times in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, and also inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame.
The All American Red Heads were the first professional women's basketball team. In 1936, almost 50 years after women's basketball began, C. M. "Ole" Olson started a barnstorming team which would play around the country until 1986. The name of the team came from Olson's wife, who owned a number of beauty salons in the south. They played by men's rules and were a smash success with the audience. They were so successful as an exhibition team that they fostered two other teams, the Ozark Hillbillies and the Famous Red Heads.
The National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC), headquartered in Kansas City, Missouri, is an American organization of men's college basketball coaches. It was founded in 1927 by Phog Allen, the men's basketball head coach for the University of Kansas.
The Kansas Sports Hall of Fame is a museum located in Wichita, dedicated to preserving the history of sports in the state of Kansas. The museum provides exhibits, archives, facilities, services, and activities to honor those individuals and teams whose achievements in sports brought distinction to themselves, to their communities and to the entire state of Kansas.
The FIBA Hall of Fame, or FIBA Basketball Hall of Fame, honors players, coaches, teams, referees, and administrators who have greatly contributed to international competitive basketball. It was established by FIBA in 1991. Originally built in Alcobendas, Community of Madrid, Spain, by the Pedro Ferrándiz Foundation, it included the "Samaranch Library", the largest basketball library in the world with an estimated 10,000 basketball books and 950 magazines from over 65 countries. After ratification from the Central Board, it moved to the new FIBA headquarters as part of The Patrick Baumann House of Basketball after its construction was completed in 2013.
Herb Magee, commonly referred to as the Shot Doctor, is an American former men's college basketball coach, who coached for 54 seasons at NCAA Division II Thomas Jefferson University. The school was established in its current form when Philadelphia University, Magee's alma mater, merged with the original Thomas Jefferson University in 2017. The former Philadelphia University was known as Philadelphia College of Textiles & Science and athletically branded as "Philadelphia Textile" when Magee first became head coach in 1967, becoming Philadelphia University in 1999. He has spent 54 years as head coach, and 62 years as either a player or coach at the school as of 2021. In 2015, he achieved his 1,000th win as a head coach, becoming one of only four college coaches to achieve that milestone. On August 12, 2011, Magee was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
David Hixon is a retired American college basketball head coach who spent 42 years coaching Amherst College. As head coach, he transformed the Amherst men's basketball program into one of the best in the nation.
Marianne Crawford Stanley is an American basketball coach. She previously served as the head coach of the Washington Mystics and Indiana Fever of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA).
Joseph Richard Vancisin was an American basketball coach and executive. He coached at Yale University from 1956 to 1975, and later was the executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches from 1975 to 1992. He is a member of the College Basketball Hall of Fame. In 1993, he received the John Bunn Award. Vancisin died in Atlanta, Georgia, in March 2021 at the age of 98.
The 1958–59 Tennessee A&I State Tigers basketball team represented Tennessee A&I State College in National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) men's basketball during the 1958–59 season. Coached by fifth-year head coach John McLendon, the Tigers finished the season with a school-record 32 wins and were crowned NAIA national champions by winning the 1959 NAIA tournament. This marked the third of three consecutive national championships, a feat that no other team at any level of college basketball had previously accomplished. In 2019, all three national championship teams were inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
