Robertson, Oscar P.
Basketball
b. Nov. 24, 1938, Charlotte, TN
Boston Celtics' coach Red Auerbach summed up Robertson: "He's so great he scares me. He can beat you all by himself and usually does." And "Phog" Allen, a college coach for 46 years, said, "Oscar Robertson is the greatest player of all time for a fellow his size."
His size was 6-foot-5 and he weighed 220 pounds in his prime, yet he was a guard. After leading Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis to 45 straight wins and two state championships, Robertson entered the University of Cincinnati in 1956. He became the first sophomore to lead the nation in scoring and the first player to be the scoring leader three times.
An All-American in 1958, 1959, and 1960, Robertson averaged 33.8 points and 15.2 rebounds a game during his college career. He scored 56 points in a 1958 game to set a Madison Square Garden record and 62 in a 1960 game to set an NCAA record. After his senior year, he starred for the gold medal U. S. Olympic team and then joined the Cincinnati Royals.
His impact was immediate. The Royals improved from 14 victories to 33 and their home attendance more than tripled, from 58,244 to 207,020. Robertson led the NBA in assists, finished third in scoring, and was named the rookie of the year.
A "triple double"--having double figures in points, rebounds, and assists in a game--is considered a major accomplishment. Robertson averaged a triple double for the entire 1961-62 season, when he scored 2,432 points, had 899 assists, and pulled down 985 rebounds in 79 games. No other player has ever done that.
Robertson spent ten seasons with Cincinnati, averaging more than 30 points a game in six of them. He was a first-team All-Star each of his first nine seasons and he was named the league's most valuable player for the 1963-64 season.
In 1970, he was traded to the Milwaukee Bucks, where Lew Alcindor (later Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) was entering his second season. With Robertson both scoring and feeding Alcindor, the Bucks won the NBA championship in only their third season of existence.
Robertson retired in 1974. In 1,040 regular season games, he scored 26,710 points, a 25.7 average, had 9,887 assists and 7,804 rebounds. He scored 1,910 points in 86 playoff games, a 22.2 average, and also had 769 assists and 578 rebounds. In 1980, he was named to the NBA's thirty-fifth anniversary team.