Men's Basketball | April 06, 2019

USC All-American and NBA All-Star guard Paul Westphal was elected into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame today (April 6).
 
Westphal is the 11th Trojan in the Basketball Hall of Fame, joining 6 other men—Bill Sharman, Jack Gardner, Alex Hannum, Tex Winter and coaches Sam Barry and George Raveling—and 4 women (Cheryl Miller, Cynthia Cooper, Lisa Leslie and Tina Thompson).
 
He will be enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame with 11 other honorees from the 2019 class during festivities in Springfield, Mass., on Sept. 6.
 
Westphal was a key member of the 1971 USC men's basketball team that posted a 24-2 record, a school mark for wins and winning percentage. The next year, he was an All-American first team guard and team captain. A 3-time letterman (1970-72) who averaged 16.9 points a game in his career, he led the Trojans in scoring in 1972 with a 20.3 average. 
 
The 10th pick of the 1972 draft, he starred in the NBA with the Boston Celtics (including the 1974 NBA champions), Phoenix Suns, Seattle SuperSonics and New York Knicks. He scored 12,397 points during his 12-year NBA career and averaged 15.6 points and 4.4 assists per game in his career.  He was a 5-time NBA All-Star and 3-time All-NBA first teamer. He was the NBA Comeback Player of the Year in 1983.
 
He then began his coaching career, first at several small colleges (his 1988 Grand Canyon College team won the NAIA national championship), then as an NBA assistant with the Suns. He was the Suns' head coach for 4 seasons (1993-96), guiding the 1993 club to the NBA Finals, before taking over the Seattle SuperSonics and then at Pepperdine, and finally serving as an assistant with the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, Sacramento Kings and Brooklyn Nets.  He also served as a basketball broadcaster on FOX Sports Net.
 
He was inducted into the USC Athletic Hall of Fame in 1997, the Phoenix Suns Ring of Honor in 1998, the Pac-12 Hall of Honor in 2008 and the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2018..
 
Joining Westphal in the 2019 Basketball Hall of Fame class are Bill Fitch, Bobby Jones, Sidney Moncrief, Jack Sikma, Teresa Weatherspoon, the Tennessee A&I teams of 1957-59, Al Attles, Charles "Chuck" Cooper, Vlade Divac, Carl Braun and the Wayland Baptist Flying Queens of 1948-82.