10. Caldwell Jones
caldwell
This brother could play.
College: Albany State (Georgia)
NBA Draft: Round 2/Pick 32 by Philadelphia 76ers
ABA Playing Career: 1973-76
NBA Playing Career: 1976-90
All-Star Appearances: 1 as ABA All-Star
Career High Averages
Points per game: 19.5
Rebounds per game: 10.0
Assists per game: 2.1
Steals per game: 1.1
Blocks per game: 4.0
50.7 % FG
83.7 % FT
One of six brothers to play at Albany State, “CJ” left with his family’s highest career rebounding average at 20.3 rpg. Even before his first pro game, the 6-11 post man made quite an impression on his rookie head coach, 37-year-old Wilt Chamberlain.
Chamberlain, then 7-1 and approaching 300 pounds, was “Godzilla in sweat pants and Converse All-Stars,” with “nostrils flaring, chest heaving, grinning a grin that had some evil in it,” as former San Diego Union sports reporter Joe Hamelin put it.
On the Conquistadors’ first day of drills, Wilt the Stilt lined up his new players to test their manhood. They “stood in a row until summoned, one by one, to dribble down the lane to their doom, to where Chamberlain was waiting like a Mayan god demanding sacrifice,” Hamelin wrote.
With little apparent effort he rejected their pitifully human layups, fly-swatting them to various distant parts of the USD gym. Contempt was etched into his face. Whap! Whap! Wilt was letting them know who was boss.
And then came Caldwell Jones.
The rest had tried to go around Chamberlain. Jones, 6-11, built like a fence post and full of flight, chose to go over him!
Launching himself into the air like some enormous bony bird, Jones went up over Chamberlain till his waist was even with the big fellow’s unbelieving eyes. Then he brought the ball down with all the youthful exuberance in him, slamming it through the cords so hard it struck Chamberlain solidly on the shoulder and bounded 10 feet in the air. From the look on Wilt’s face, you’d have thought he’d been shot.
Caldwell Jones put up his biggest numbers in the ABA and went on to serve as a defensive anchor for the Dr. J-led 76er conference champion teams of the late 1970s and early 1980s.
9. Charles Oakley
College: Virginia Union University (Richmond, Va.)
NBA Draft: Round 1/Pick 9 by Cleveland Cavaliers
NBA Playing Career: 1985-2004
All-Star Appearances: 1
Career High Averages:
Points per game: 14.6
Rebounds per game: 13.1
Assists per game: 3.6
Steals per game: 1.6
Blocks per game: 0.6
52.4% FG
85.1% FT
The ever-solid “Oak” killed the competition from the get-go at Virginia Union, eventually averaging 24 points and 17.3 rebounds as a senior. He spent his first three years unable to help Michael Jordan get over the hump, then spent the next decade futilely trying to help get Patrick Ewing past Michael Jordan. Oakley was nothing if not consistent.
And really, really strong.
8. Vern Mikkelson
College: Hamline University (Saint Paul, Minn.)
NBA Draft: Territorial by Minneapolis Lakers
NBA Playing Career: 1949-1959
All-Star Appearances: 6
Career High Averages
Points per game: 18.7
Rebounds per game: 11.2
Assists per game: 2.8
40.3% FG
76.6% FT
Mikkelson, who helped lead the Lakers to four NBA titles, was a pioneer in a few ways. He was one of the game’s great musicians who could have chosen a pro music career after playing basketball at Hamline, now in NCAA Division III. The 6-7 post had been the first small-college player ever in the East-West College All-Star Game, held annually at Madison Square Garden in New York (he led all scorers).
Mikkelson became known as the NBA’s first power forward.
7. Jack Sikma
College: Illinois Wesleyan University
NBA Draft: Round 1/Pick 8 by Seattle Supersonics
NBA Playing Career: 1977-1991
All-Star Appearances: 7
Career High Averages
Points per game: 22.0
Rebounds per game: 10.0
Assists per game: 5.5
Steals per game: 1.3
Blocks per game: 1.4
52.4% FG
50.0% FT
After averaging 27.0 points and 15.4 rebounds his senior year in Division III, Sikma soon broke into the highest ranks of the NBA by helping Seattle win its only title in 1979. His long, flowing blond hair, long limbs and rangy defense make appear in old footage as some kind of proto-Kirilenko, but Sikma was a far better offensive player. As a 6-11 center, he led the league in free throw shooting accuracy, and patented a step-back, reverse pivot jumper that is an embryonic version of the one-foot fadeaway Nowitzki has mastered:
6. Dennis Rodman
College: Southeastern Oklahoma State
NBA Draft: Round 2/Pick 27 by Detroit Pistons
NBA Playing Career: 1986-2000
All-Star Appearances: 2
Career High Averages
Points per game: 11.6
Rebounds per game: 18.7
Assists per game: 3.1
Steals per game: 0.9
Blocks per game: 0.9
59.5 % FG
31.7 % 3PT
Rodman was a dominant force at NAIA Southeastern Oklahoma State, not only on the boards (career average 15.7 rpg) but also scoring (career average 25.7 ppg). That, of course, changed once the 6-8 forward hit the NBA, where he focused on defense and rebounding for the Pistons, then Spurs and Bulls. By 1998, he was a five-time NBA champion.
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If you want to drill down a whole lot deeper on the small-college question, take a look at my 2007 book about small college basketball, Cinderella Ball. The issues are quite complex, but the common thread is money. Read the book. It’s the only one out there to take a hard look at this question.
I totally whiffed there, Bill. Thanks for reminding about Randy, who should have been in the Top 10. I sure wish there was an up-to-date resource listing all the DII, DIII and NAIA NBA/ABA players.
Nice article – but you should include Randy Smith – Buffalo St. Div. III – 1971 7th Round pick of Buffalo Braves – help consecutive games record of 906 for awhile – MVP of 1978 All- Star game.