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Princeton University Athletics
Bradley Named Men's Basketball Player Of The Century
January 07, 2000 | Men's Basketball
Jan. 7, 2000
He was not born to it, none of it. His father left school at 16 to work for a railroad, his mother was a teacher. He was an only child.
His father would leave the railroad to take the lowest position at the local bank, and he would work his way all the way to the top as its president.
Still, this was Crystal City, a Missouri town of 3,500 far from the Eastern establishment.
There are four legitimate contenders for President of the United States in the 2000 race. One is George W. Bush, whose father was President of the United States. One is Al Gore, himself the Vice President whose father was a powerful political figure in Congress before him. One is John McCain, whose father and grandfather were four-star admirals in the Navy.
The other is Bill Bradley, the son of a small-town Midwest railroad worker-turned-banker and teacher.
Bill Bradley, the greatest basketball player—and quite likely the greatest athlete—in Princeton University history. Bill Bradley, the Princeton Athletic News men's basketball Player of the Century.
Bill Bradley, who has led a life of such achievement while maintaining the highest level of character that it's easy to forget that he is the great American Everyman, risen from the most ordinary of backgrounds to the doorstep of the most important job on Earth.
Those who saw him play at Princeton speak of him to this day with awe. Those who were too young are left to try to comprehend the numbers, the shear volume of accomplishment that at once speaks for itself and yet tells none of the story.
Bill Bradley played three years of varsity basketball at Princeton, leading the Tigers to Ivy League titles in 1963, 1964 and 1965 and the 1965 NCAA Final Four.
His individual accomplishments at Princeton include:
• 2,503 career points, an average of 30.2 per game, with no three-point shot or shot clock • 936 points his junior year alone
• the 13 highest scoring single-game performances in school history
• 20 career games with 35 or more points, every other player in Princeton history has combined for five
• a career-high of 58 points, which at the time was the highest single-game total in college basketball history
• the three highest single-season scoring averages in school history
• school single-season and career records for points, scoring average, field goals made and free throws made and the career record for rebounds
• 12 Ivy League records, excluding three-point shooting, every other Ivy League player in history combined holds 14 records
Consider this as well: In 83 career games Bill Bradley never scored fewer than 16 points. Only five other players in school history (three before him, two since) have averaged at least 16 points per game for their careers.
For all of that, Bill Bradley's career, not just at Princeton, has been about much more than numbers. Former teammates and former rivals, casual observers and those who chronicled his accomplishments all speak reverently about his work ethic, how he would practice the same shot over and over, hundreds and hundreds of times, thousands and thousands of times, until he had it mastered. He could shoot from the outside, or he could go to the basket. He could play with the ball or without the ball.
Bradley came to Princeton after originally deciding on Duke. He played basketball and baseball at first and actually hit .315 as a first baseman his sophomore year before concentrating solely on basketball.
Bradley led Princeton into epic contests, including the 1964 Holiday Festival loss to Michigan and the 1965 regional final against highly favored Providence in which Bradley scored 41 points each time. Then there was the consolation game win over Wichita State, where he scored his 58.
His NCAA tournament average of 33.7 points per game remains the second all-time, behind Austin Carr of Notre Dame. The 58 points are the second-best total in NCAA tournament history, also behind Carr (61).
After graduation, Bradley delayed his career in the NBA to attend Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. He then helped the Knicks win two NBA championships in his 10 years before turning to politics, where he won three terms as a Democratic senator from New Jersey. He was elected to the basketball Hall of Fame in 1988.
The Knicks retired his number 24, his Princeton 42 is technically not retired, though no one has worn it since.
Who could? Maybe anyman, since Bill Bradley is Everyman, the American dream come true, the ideal that it's not where you're born but where you take yourself.