Abdul-Jabbar Shares Special Moment Coaches, Teammates Draw Praise As Kareem Enters Hoop Hall Of Fame

He began by thanking his fifth-grade basketball coach and went on to thank so many others.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, among the greatest players in basketball history, said Monday night the path to the Basketball Hall of Fame was not a solitary one. There were so many people along the way.

“No one gets to this level without good teammates and I had such tremendously good teammates,” he said.

The greatest scorer in NBA history was quick to point out he played with three of the game’s top assist leaders - Magic Johnson, Oscar Robertson and Guy Rodgers.

During his induction speech, Abdul-Jabbar also spoke of Farrell Hopkins, the fifth-grade coach who gave him his first lessons in teamwork. He also mentioned his eighthgrade teacher, his high school coach and finally his fellow players in the NBA.

Abdul-Jabbar was inducted along with women’s stars Cheryl Miller and Anne Donovan, longtime Soviet coach Aleksandr Gomelsky, the late referee Earl Strom and the Minneapolis Lakers duo of coach John Kundla and forward Vern Mikkelsen.

Abdul-Jabbar recalled once bragging about his good grades to John Wooden, his Hall of Fame coach at UCLA.

“He just looked at me and said ‘What do you think you are here for?”’ Abdul-Jabbar said.

Said Wooden: “He was the most valuable player the college game has ever had, on or off the court.”

Hall of Famer Jerry West, the Lakers’ general manager, served as Abdul-Jabbar’s escort Monday when Wooden couldn’t make the ceremonies.

“It seems that taller players can never do enough to please people both on and off the court,” West said. “But that was never the case with Kareem. The more he played, the more I respected him for the way he performed. He is the greatest player of all time.”

Kundla and Mikkelsen had waited longest and were determined to savor every moment of their enshrinement.

“I’m so high I don’t know when I’ll come down,” said Mikkelsen, who pioneered the power forward position for the Lakers’ first dynasty.

Mikkelsen had been nominated seven times since 1979.

“Sometimes things are sweeter for the wait,” he said. “And going in with my coach is the icing on the cake.”

Kundla, who guided the Lakers to six league titles in the seven years (1948-54), had a simple explanation for his long wait.

“With the players I had I was expected to win,” he said, listing Hall of Famers George Mikan, Jim Pollard, Slater Martin, Clyde Lovellette and Elgin Baylor.

“If I hadn’t, I would and should have been fired,” Kundla said. “But the only time people noticed us was when we lost.”

Miller, who played with Donovan on the 1984 Olympic team and coaches the women’s team at USC, said Donovan revolutionized the center position in women’s basketball.

“She could run the floor like a forward and had a very, very soft touch from 15 to 17 feet from the basket,” Miller said. “She’s so softspoken, but there was no getting in her face. You would never see it coming, but the next thing you knew, the trainer would be picking you up off the floor.”

Miller said she could not sleep Sunday night while trying to think of something to say at the induction.

“It’s just overwhelming,” she said. “You work your whole life to be the best. And never ever dream of anything like this - the Hall of Fame.”