LSU Gold

Lowe: Pettit a 'Standard Bearer' of LSU Basketball

by Kent Lowe (@LSUkent)
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Lowe: Pettit a 'Standard Bearer' of LSU Basketball

It surprises me as a basketball fan and an LSU basketball guy when I hear people talk about the history of the game at our school and the names are thrown out of the great and near-great players that have worn the purple and gold in the last 100-plus years.

What saddens me is when they forget a name that should be on the list without any exceptions, reservations or qualifying monikers.

Robert “Bob” Pettit.

Come this Saturday at soon after 4:30 p.m., maybe Bob Pettit will be recognized and remembered by a new group of basketball fans who may not be aware or who may have forgotten what a great star of the game he was.

He will join Shaquille O’Neal as the second player to have a statue unveiled for him outside the practice facility of the building named for another of the LSU greats, Pete Maravich.

Pettit will be there to unveil his playing likeness and even at 83, this gentle giant of a man could probably still take on a few in a game of “horse.”

He is one of the standard bearers of LSU Basketball.

My point is very simple. If you are a basketball fan of any kind in Baton Rouge you should make the effort to come to the statue area and celebrate the life and legacy of a special basketball legend. A Louisiana guy. Future statues and location and all that rhetoric is just so much noise. Those things will happen and are for another time. This is the time to salute Bob Pettit and remember why this guy is in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

Friday we are going to give you a Bob Pettit timeline to his career, but suffice it to say, this man has done it all. All-City as a prepster. All-American at LSU. Led his team to the Final Four at a time when no one knew what the Final Four meant. First LSU player to have his number retired in any sport. Street later named for him.

Second pick NBA Draft. NBA MVP, NBA All-Star MVP, Scoring champ, NBA Champion.

Those are some of the things we will go in depth about this man who brought the city and the state prestigious on a national scale.

Now one of the impossibilities in sports in my mind is comparing this to that and that to this when it comes to different era and the style of play in different times. But you can’t tell me that Bob Pettit wouldn’t be a star on any LSU team in which you want to put him into the game as a young college player. Sure his style would have to be different but there is that feeling that he was always good enough to play any way, any style.

Plus put him back in the mid-1970s and beyond and he would have been able to play a fourth season of varsity basketball. On one hand, what would his number have been with a freshman season on the stats? On the other hand, would he be one-and-done. Would he have been like Shaq and stayed three years? Would he have event come to college at all or would he be heading straight from high school to the NBA as there was a time when that was the deal?

All speculation, but that’s what you do.

All in know is that in a time when basketball games didn’t have a shot clock, was a lot more disciplined in style and much different than 2016, Bob Pettit scored enough points in three years from 1952-54 to still 60-plus years later stand sixth all-time in points at LSU at 1,916.

Ahead of him, let’s see – No. 5 Shaq 1,941 (3 years); 4. Howard Carter 1,942 (4 years); 3. Tasmin Mitchell 1,989 (4 years & 3 games); 2. Rudy Macklin 2,080 (4 years & 2 games); and, 1. Pete Maravich, 3,667 (3 years).

More impressive might be his three-year rebound number of 1,039 that remains fourth to this day and one of just four players to pull down 1,039. He got 1,039 and his teammate Ned Clark is fifth at 988. There appears not to have been too many rebounds for teammates or opponents to pick up along the way.

In an era, when you could go to the Final Four and still not play more than 25 games, Pettit and his Tigers won 59 games in three years and that’s impressive as well.

Now it would never happen today because of lots of rules that are in place but for Bob Pettit to be the first player to have his jersey retired in LSU history at the conclusion of his career is an amazing accomplishment. That it came in basketball may surprise people but that’s how good he was.

I just want people to understand that you cannot have a discussion about the legacy of LSU Basketball without Bob Pettit. You can debate greatest player to ever put on an LSU jersey, but if Bob Pettit isn’t mentioned in the discussion for you to choose from then you really aren’t doing justice to your discussion.

This statue is deserved and worthy of you, if you are an LSU Basketball aficionado, making the effort to be there Saturday at 4:30 p.m. to celebrate this occasion.

Player, Graduate. Final Four Legacy at LSU. All-Star, MVP, Champion in NBA. Hall of Famer in name and life. More on Bob Pettit on this page Friday.