What if Knute Rockne came to Bloomington in 1914 and changed the trajectory of IU football? Bird was one of the best scorers in the country, a big forward who led the way for the Sycamores from the Missouri Valley Conference to the biggest national stage. There is no question about his eligibility.. On the day after his uniform was retired in basketball, Larry Bird took the field for both games of a doubleheader in baseball for the Indiana State Sycamores. The next season, 1974-75, is where two of the greatest What ifs in IU basketball collide: What if Bird had stayed and what if Scott May, the teams second-leading scorer and second-leading rebounder, hadnt broken his arm against Purdue in late February? The 75 Hoosiers were loaded. Larry Joe Bird (born December 7, 1956) is an American former professional basketball player, coach, and executive in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Our reasoning for presenting offensive logos. The hours he had spent working on his shot as a youngster paid big dividends in the NBA. Career Stats Game Log Splits. The couple has two adopted children named Conner Mariah.. Family. It determined the balance of power in the NBA throughout the 1980s, arguably the most important era in NBA history, helping to reestablish the Celtics as the best team in the Eastern Conference during this time. He just hammered him for being lackadaisical off of the screen and made him leave the open gym session. Lets pick a winner in every mens college basketball conference tournament. '", Indiana State coach Bill Hodges on the notion that man-to-man defenses might slow Bird down: "If we go against a UCLA or a Notre Dame later on and they play man-to-man, that's when you'll see how tough Larry really is. But his arrogant attitude is hardly a big surprise to those who know about Benson. Do you have a sports website? Bird had actually nailed the jumper from the corner. He has tallied 1,556 steals, as well as 755 blocks and 5,695 dimes. The former NBA player met his second wife, Dinah Mattingly, at Indiana State. In order to finish his college degree, Larry Bird was working at Ballinger's school as a physical education student-teacher just weeks before becoming an . The Celtics won the physical, bitter series in seven games and advanced to the NBA Finals for the fourth consecutive year, meeting the Lakers for the third time. I think they may even have been on the floor together. Check out the detailed 1977-78 Indiana State Sycamores Roster and Stats for College Basketball at Sports-Reference.com Gambling problem? Once every generation or so, a player comes along who can truly be called a superstar. ", In Bird's own words, here's the value he placed on ball movement: "My feeling about passing is that it don't matter who's doing the scoring as long as it's us. Talking trash to Larry Bird rarely ever ended well, as former NBA player Rodney Rogers found out the hard way. May 16, 2022. When he talks, you come into his world. Larry Bird Comparisons: ( players sorted by last name ) - A-Larry Bird vs Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He became only the third player (and the first non-center) to win three consecutive NBA Most Valuable Player Awards. Bird soon realized that it was actually HE who was the target of Knight's ridicule--because of the way he had come off of a screen in a pick up game. Season-ticket sales tripled. "He's 6-9, was the nation's second leading scorer and that's not all," wrote The Evening Sun's Bill Tanton. On The Players Tribune's "Knuckleheads" podcast, former NBA All-Star Jamal Mashburn said Rogers had talked trash to Bird after a day of practice between the 1992 College Select Team and the 1992 Dream Team.. After a practice, as a group of players were standing around, Mashburn said . When Bird maximized his potential at Indiana State in the 1978-79 season, he took a Sycamores team that had a first-year head coach and was picked to finish third or fourth in the Missouri Valley Conference in 1979 and carried it all the way to the national championship game with an undefeated record and the countrys No. We had guys last year who didn't care about passing. At Indiana State here is what Bird did: 1976-77..aveged 32.8 ppg, 1977-78..averaged 30 ppg and 1978-79 ..28.6 ppggiving him a 3 years career average at indiana State of 30.3 ppg. forty-five, the most effective larry bird [] 0%, great for twelfth throughout MLB between eligible remedies. According to The New York Times, Hodges once said his primary contribution during Indiana States national runner-up season was not messing up Larry Bird.. Durant, a four-time scoring champion, now sets his sights on Hakeem Olajuwon in 12th place. 2 Notre Dame, No. 33 retired by the school. Bird had a double-double in all five NCAA tournament games he played in that year. 'Can I stay in bed?' The following year was Birds last. If the answer was yes, then theres a chance there would be national championship banners from 1975 and 1976 hanging inside Assembly Hall right now. UCLA beat Montana by just three points in its second tournament game, proving the Bruins were a resilient, but mortal, champion. Become an Annual VIP member today and get access to VIP content, ad-free forums & more. Theres no guarantee Bird wouldve stuck around for his senior season if he had stayed at IU, but doing so couldve allowed him to be the featured scorer on the Hoosiers if he wanted a larger share of shots after playing alongside Benson, the No. The Cavaliers won in seven games; Boston lost three of the four games couldnt play because of his back. The Hick from French Lick. 2022-23 Season Schedule; Larry Bird, AKA "Larry Legend," was selected by the Boston Celtics with the sixth overall pick in the 1978 NBA Draft. We present them here for purely educational purposes. Neither Birds hometown of French Lick nor West Baden had a daily newspaper at the time, nor was either home to a radio or TV station. He initially enrolled at Indiana University in 1974 but dropped out before the season began. ---------------------------------------------------- Thanks Jimmie. Looks like Bradley's coach on 2/10/79 tried to give Bird the same treatment . NAISMITH AWARDS: Player of the Year | Coach of the Year | Defensive Player of the Year, While Bird was most known for his scoring, he had a well-rounded game that included double-digit rebound totals and unselfish passing. Find out more. Get to know Larry Bird: Stats, records and more, How the Celtics landed Larry Bird in the NBA Draft, 1988 NBA Playoff Highlights: Larry Bird and Dominique Wilkins epic showdown, Celtics 75th Season: Bird-Dr. J fight adds to 76ers rivalry, Celtics 75th Season: Bird's debut, Ford sinks first NBA '3', Looking back on Larry Bird's steal against the Pistons, Bill Walton on what made Bird the best he ever played with, Bird's gutsy performance vs. Pacers in '91 series clincher, Three-time NBA champion (1981, 1984, 1986), Three-time All-NBA Defensive Second Team (1982-84), Three-time NBA Three-Point Contest champion (1986-88). where they fell to the Michigan State Spartans. Bird did a fine job in his three seasons on the bench. Then one day, Warn called Bird a wuss for his seemingly endless postgame recovery and threw down the gauntlet when he picked up a baseball. He has accounted for 1,556 steals, as well as 755 blocks and 5,695 assists. I also really believe he can be a heck of a coach. That story is largely lost to time and even better, he did it mostly because of a dare. In 1987-88, Bird was the first Celtic ever to record a 40-20 game, with a 42-point, 20-rebound effort against Indiana. Drafted into the NBA by the Boston Celtics with the sixth overall pick in . His Mom and Dad divorced while Bird was in HS, His dad shot and killed himself a year later. I could do that. Do you have a sports website? Complete NBA coaching record for Larry Bird, including regular season and postseason games. Recently crowned national champion N.C. State also joined the pursuit of Bird in mid-April 1974, right before he was slated to sign his National Letter of Intent with the Hoosiers. 'Coach, I'm dead,' moaned Bird. We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. This blog is forever grateful for the meme template that sweet, sweet banner gave us. Every Sports Reference Social Media Account, Site Last Updated: Saturday, March 4, 4:50AM. He earned the Rookie of the Year honours and also led a mediocre team . So it is a moot point. Extremely high basketball IQ, pure heart and hustle. Our reasoning for presenting offensive logos. The end of Birds career was at hand, but not before one last achievement: a gold medal with the 1992 U.S. Olympic Dream Team, which dominated the competition at Barcelona and won millions of fans for the sport with its brilliance. The following year Bird posted the third-longest free-throw streak in NBA history, hitting 71 consecutive attempts. The Boston Celtics had selected him in the 1978 NBA Draft, hoping that Bird, who had become eligible for the NBA after his junior year, might forgo his senior season-but knowing he was worth the wait even if he didnt. Before the draft, Larry Bird had just finished his junior year at Indiana State. Larry Bird was a co-star of one of the greatest college basketball national championship games ever Bird vs. Magic, when the undefeated Indiana State Sycamores took on the co-Big Ten champion Michigan State Spartans in the 1979 championship. Michael Jordan has compiled 41,011 minutes and has participated . The only thing that wouldve been more painful for some IU fans than briefly landing Bird, only to see him become a folk hero up the road, would have been losing him to Kentucky. Name: Larry Bird. Knight said(to the effect).."I didn't handle that well, I just let him goI had a lot of good players(at the time) who were happy to be where they wereto me, we had a great team shaping up and I didn; envision Bird playing much for us until he was a junior, anyway. Bird won 3 MVP Awards, was selected to play in 12 All-Star Games, and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1998. Larry used BB to escape from his family problems! "'You appear to be enjoying this,' one reporter commented. He starred in college at Indiana State, taking them to the NCAA final game in 1979, virtually as a one-man team. Everyone knew Bird was destined for greatness in the NBA, but that didnt stop Indiana State baseball coach Bob Warn from roasting him. Indiana womens basketball Q&A: HooplaWyatt on the Big Ten Tournament. Imagine Thomas, Bird and Magic on the same team. A disk was removed from his back after the season, but it didnt help all that much. Larry Bird SF #33. Or write about sports? Its also fair to speculate that the south wall of Assembly Hall might be a little more crowded if Larry Bird had never transferred from IU. He was selected to play in 12 All-Star games. Here you have the answers. Having grabbed 7,217 defensive rebounds and 1,757 offensive, Bird has accumulated 8,974 total rebounds during his NBA career. But he has said many times over the years that he would have never been able to play for Bob Knight. Larry Joe Bird (Larry Legend, The Hick from French Lick, Kodak, The Great White Hope) Born: December 7, 1956 in West Baden, Indiana High School: Springs Valley in French Lick, Indiana College: Indiana State University Hall of Fame: Inducted as Player in 1998 As Player: 897 G, 24.3 PPG, 10.0 RPG, 6.3 APG (Full Record) Students skipped class to line up for tickets eight hours before tipoff. As a senior, Bird became the schools all-time scoring champion and about 4,000 people attended his final home game. Published Jan. 28 . Check out the top highlights and plays from Larry Bird's storied NBA career. Bird was named the 1978-79 College Player of the Year and left Indiana State as the fifth-highest scorer in NCAA history. 31.8 - HOF Larry Bird - Indiana State - 30.3 . Hodges is credited with recruiting Larry Bird to Indiana State and coached Bird in the famous 1979 NCAA Final against Michigan State. Larry Bird was originally in the recruiting class of 1974. Watch our How-To Videos to Become a Stathead, Subscribe to Stathead and get access to more data than you can imagine. This was easy to see when you noticed Bird's basketball stats. . His focus was on the court. He thought he had been playing pretty damn good that day. It's because of Bird. It may have also hurt him in his transition to a big state school, where he lasted a matter of weeks after the start of the school year. Larry Bird - Stats, Game Logs, Splits, and much more . Larry Bird then married Dinah Mattingly on September 30, 1989, who he met while studying at the Indiana State University. As the NBA celebrates it's 75th Anniversary Season, get to know dozens of star players who helped make the NBA what it is today. In his first season, the Pacers with Reggie Miller as their main weapon were defeated by the defending-champion Chicago Bulls and Jordan in a tough seven-game conference finals series. May 12, 1997: Hired as Head Coach by the Indiana Pacers. Mike Hayes, a Kentucky Wesleyan player, recounted the game, vividly remembering Birds bizarre, ungainly swing. It was interesting to me a I never knew that Larry Bird had signed to play for Indiana, and the story of how he ended up at Indiana Stateinteresting stuff! Knight said that when Bird came to campus in the Fall of 1974, and the team would organize pick up games, that Bird would commonly get left out and would not be picked It was merely an escalated version of Warns usual brand of teasing, but Bird had enough and was ready to prove a point. Birds 19 points in the 1982 NBA All-Star Game, including 12 of the Easts last 15, earned him the games MVP trophy. All logos are the trademark & property of their owners and not Sports Reference LLC. 18 Alabama and No. Larry Bird's accomplishments and stats make him one of the greatest pure shooters of all time. What if Larry Bird hadnt transferred from IU. Scott Horner. Copyright 2000-2023 Sports Reference LLC. The 16th-leading scorer of all-time in NCAA mens basketball history scored 2,850 points in just three seasons an incredible 30.3 career scoring average after enrolling at Indiana University in the fall of 1974. Nicknamed "the Hick from French Lick" and "Larry Legend", Bird is widely regarded as one of the greatest basketball players of all time.He is the only person in NBA history to be named Rookie of the Year, Most Valuable Player, Finals . Cathie. Year Event GP MIN PTS FGM FGA FG% 3PM 3PA 3PT% FTM FTA FT% TRB AST STL BLK TOV PF Place; 1992: Olympic Games . He missed 37 games because of the continuing back problems. Larry Bird's Wife Dinah Mattingly. They teamed with Bird and veteran Cedric Maxwell in a frontcourt that carried the Celtics to the championship in 1981. In addition to his three championship rings, Bird piled up an awesome collection of personal achievements. RotoWire considers the best player values in Yahoo fantasy leagues for Friday's 10-game slate. A brutal sucker punch in the OVC tournament stopped the game in its tracks. Taking a look at the numbers behind Nikola Jokic's historic season for the Nuggets. His coaching career was shot out of a Larry Bird-sized cannon with the Sycamores going 33-1 and posting a .971 winning percentage in his rookie campaign. Two months later, he signed his NBA contract with the Boston Celtics. He won the NBA Executive of the Year award in 2012 to become the only person in NBA history to win Most Valuable Player, Coach of the Year and Executive of the Year. Bird's stats are about as crazy as one would expect one the greatest players of all time to be if they played in a mid-major conference. Bird returned to his role with the Pacers in 2013 before stepping down in 2017 to assume an advisory role for the franchise. Bird, the Coach of the Year in 1997-98, resigned as Pacers coach after Indianas Finals appearance. Widely regarded as one of the greatest basketballers of all time, it . Bird nearly doubled the Sycamores win total year-over-year from 13 to 25 after sitting out just one year in 1975-76, rather than two, after IU signed papers for Birds release. With five seconds remaining and the Celtics trailing 107-106, Bird stole an Isiah Thomas inbounds pass and fed Dennis Johnson, whose layup gave Boston the win. Lost to most people in the basketball statistics for the Springs Valley team that year, however, was a short piece in a Bedford newspaper that noted, "The freshman free-throw trophy was presented to Larry Bird. Larry Bird is recognized as one of the greatest NBA players of all time. The Hoosiers were still very good, winning national titles in 1976 and 1981, and maybe Bird gives the Hoosiers another in 1975 or 1978, making that three chips in a six- or seven-year span. Larry Bird, playing for Indiana State, and Magic Johnson, playing for Michigan State, were two of the best basketball players during this time and were about to go head-to-head in a competition that sparked a rivalry between them that lasted throughout the 1980s. Following a sophomore season that was shortened by a broken ankle, Bird emerged as a star during his junior year. Bob Knights worst team at IU, by record, was the 1977, post-title team. Former professional NBA player, coach, and NBA executive Larry Bird is well known globally. His NBA years : from 1980 to 1992 Larry Bird NBA Stats Summary : At Springs Valley High, Bird scored 1,125 career points, averaged 30.6 points and 20.5 rebounds," Dana Hunsinger Benbow recounted in the Indianapolis Star. Join our linker program. "Larry Bird finishes things," said Dick Ballinger, the varsity head baseball coach at West Vigo High School in West Terre Haute, Indiana during the spring of 1979. Our reasoning for presenting offensive logos. Editors note: This is part of a series of stories revisiting the biggest what-ifs in IU history. Three-time NBA champion with Boston Celtics - 1981 . Larry Bird. Dinah likes to keep a low profile, making rare public appearances with her husband at basketball games. Born: December 7, 1956 in West Baden, Indiana us College: Indiana State University High School: Springs Valley in French Lick, Indiana Indiana State went 81-13 during the three seasons in which Larry Bird played for the Sycamores. Indianapolis Star. He is a graduate of Indiana University. Best Known For: Basketball icon . Like many great national championship teams, IU faced a rebuild or a reload or whatever you want to call it the next year. Bird took just two shots that night and made both, according to the Philadelphia Daily News, while he helped teammates Carl Nicks and Steve Reed score 50 combined. ", The Evening Sun's Bill Tanton: "At the beginning of the season, Indiana State was picked third or fourth in its own conference. In Game 7 of the 1988 Eastern Conference semifinals against Atlanta, Bird engaged in a memorable fourth-quarter shootout with the Hawks Dominique Wilkins. Hodges allowed Bird to sleep in, which annoyed the folks who sponsored the brunch and the award, and some in the media. Join our linker program. 0:49. Play Index. Larry Bird averages for the NBA season and Playoffs, including points, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks and other categories, year by year and career numbers. Question, Comment, Feedback, or Correction? He was a 2x 1st team All American, future #1 overall lottery pick and 1976 NCAA player of the year, leading the 76 IU team to the only undefeated national title of the next 40 years. He was a 12-time All-Star, a two-time NBA Finals MVP and a nine-time member of the All-NBA First Team. They got married in 1989 and adopted two children: Connor and Mariah Bird. the official stats partner of the NBA, NHL and MLB. Experience: 13 years. Andy Wittry has written for Stadium, SI.com, Sporting News, the Indianapolis Star, Louisville Courier-Journal and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.