In a special period of basketball — distant from the carefully-edited offseason exercises on Instagram — members of the New York Knicks spent their summers on the playground.
And that included The Captain.
Willis Reed, the Knicks legend who died Tuesday at 80, was a frequenter of Rucker Park, the famed streetball court docket in Harlem. Reed gained a pair of Rucker Pro League titles throughout his summers with the Knicks, and concerned himself in the neighborhood past basketball.
Bob McCullough, who was Reed’s teammate at Rucker Park, remembered a speech the middle offered to youth gamers at a Harlem faculty who have been a part of the Each One, Teach One program.
Reed gave a compelling anecdote concerning the significance of a school training — “this was 40 years ago and I remember it like yesterday,” McCullough stated — and was provided $50 for his look.
“He said, ‘Keep the money. Put it back in the program,’” McCullough recalled to the Daily News. “And also, I want to give 50 scholarships to your youngsters to come to my basketball camp.”
The gesture was the primary reminiscence McCullough introduced up when requested about Reed’s passing. It clearly left a mark.
On the court docket at Rucker Park, Reed’s staff, which included McCullough and a number of Knicks — Freddie Crawford, Howie Komives, Nate Bowman and Em Bryant — have been unstoppable.
Except for one sport.
The opponent included streetball sensation Pablo Robertson and was sponsored by an area bar, “Sweet and Sour.”
Reed’s squad was overwhelmed.
“These guys couldn’t miss,” McCullough stated. “They wished to kill us. We by no means knew what hit us. Shot after shot. Timeout. And then once we bought again on the court docket, they began raining photographs once more.
“Game was over. And I got into Freddie Crawford’s Cadillac. We drove up the Harlem River Drive, going nowhere, just in a daze. In our basketball uniforms. We didn’t even change. In a daze. Never knew what hit us.”
Reed didn’t lose a lot in New York after that, whether or not within the Garden or Harlem.
Reed operated in each worlds whereas a member of the Knicks, giving himself to the group. It’s why McCullough hopes to discuss Reed’s contributions to Harlem when the Knicks honor the Captain at Monday’s Madison Square Garden sport versus the Rockets.
“It was a loss,” McCullough stated. “A terrible loss.”
()
Source: www.bostonherald.com