Pete Newell

Peter Francis Newell (August 31, 1915 – November 17, 2008) was an American college men's basketball coach and basketball instructional coach. He coached for 15 years at the University of San Francisco, Michigan State University, and the University of California, Berkeley, compiling an overall record of 234 wins and 123 losses.

He led California to the NCAA title in 1959, and a year later coached the gold medal-winning U.S. team at the 1960 Summer Olympics, a team that would be inducted as a unit to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010. After his coaching career ended, he ran a world-famous instructional basketball camp and served as a consultant and scout for several National Basketball Association (NBA) teams.

Early life

Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, Newell grew up in Los Angeles, California. Encouraged by his mother, he had small roles in several movies before he turned ten. It is even said that Charlie Chaplin considered him for the title role in his film The Kid (1921), which was later played by Jackie Coogan.

Newell graduated from St. Agnes High School and was a classmate of Phil Woolpert at Loyola University of Los Angeles (now Loyola Marymount University), and played on its basketball and baseball teams. He served as general manager of the San Diego Rockets from 1968 to 1971, until the team was sold to Houston in June, 1971. After a short stint in Houston, to assist with the transfer, Pete returned to the west coast and later joined the Los Angeles Lakers. As general manager of the Lakers, he was instrumental in trading for star center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar from the Milwaukee Bucks.

Basketball camps

Considered "America's Basketball Guru", Newell conducted an annual training camp for centers and forwards known simply as "Big Man Camp", which has since been informally dubbed "Pete Newell's Big Man Camp". The camp originated when word spread that Newell was working with Kermit Washington. After Washington's game rapidly improved, more and more big men started to work with Newell, and he later opened the camp. The camp's impressive participants list features over 200 current and former NBA players. Newell attracted this list of players due to his reputation of teaching footwork, being what one publication described as "The Footwork Master". The camp has taken place in Honolulu, Hawaii and most recently Las Vegas, Nevada.

In 2001 Newell opened his version of the Big Man Camp for women and dubbed it "Pete Newell's Tall Women's Basketball Camp" with the following simple sentence serving as a summary of its intentions: "The Pete Newell Tall Women's Basketball Camp goal is to continue to do what Pete Newell has done his whole life-to teach the fundamentals and footwork of the game of basketball to young players."

Personal life

Newell's wife, Florence, died in 1984. His four sons have all been involved with basketball. His son, Pete Newell Jr., coached the Santa Cruz High School boys' basketball team to the California state championship in 2005. Greg Newell was a longtime executive at Converse. Another son, Tom Newell, is a longtime NBA scout and assistant coach who has recently worked on international basketball projects in China and Russia. Tom currently is a Fox Sports studio commentator in the network's Northwest region. His 3rd son, Roger, was the first person to bring computer software and analytics to the NBA in 1982 thru 2000 with the Newell Productivity System. This same computer software system was used throughout Jim Harrick's tenure at UCLA including their NCAA Championship season. Roger was also a consultant at Hollywood Park racetrack from 1990 to 1999

before the track was sold to Churchill Downs.

Death

Newell died in Rancho Santa Fe, California on November 17, 2008, at age 93.

Legacy

In 1979 Newell was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a contributor,

Since 2000, the National Association of Basketball Coaches has annually presented the Pete Newell Big Man Award to the top frontcourt player in the nation.

In an interview with Mike Greenberg on ESPN's Mike and Mike in the Morning on January 2, 2007, Bob Knight singled Newell out as one of the greatest coaches in men's college basketball history. Knight stated that although he had not won as many championships as some other coaches he felt "he was as good as anybody who's ever coached this game." Newell's influence on basketball is often stated in what would seem to be almost exaggerated terms by many Hall of Fame coaches and players. However, his contributions to the game of basketball have been so great that according to many Newell has perhaps had as much or more influence on the game of basketball as any person in the modern era.

Selected bibliography

Basketball Methods (1962) with John Benington
Basketball: The Sports Playbook (1976)
Basketball Post Play (1995)
Pete Newell's Defensive Basketball: Winning Techniques and Strategies (Art & Science of Coaching) (2001)

References

Sources

Chin, Oliver Clyde. The Tao of Yao: Insights from Basketball's Brightest Big Man, California: Frog, LTD. 2003
Mandelbaum, Michael. The Meaning Of Sports: why americans watch baseball, football and basketball and what they see when they do, New York: Public Affairs 2004
Ramsay, Jack and Halberstam, David. Dr. Jack's Leadership Lessons Learned From a Lifetime in Basketball, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. 2004