Category: Los Angeles Lakers Blog

Walt Hazzard, the former UCLA and NBA star who played on the Bruins’ first NCAA championship basketball team in 1964 and later coached the team for four seasons in the 1980s, died Friday. He was 69.

Hazzard’s family said he had been recuperating for a long time from complications following heart surgery. The school said Hazzard died at UCLA Ronald Reagan Medical Center.

He had a stroke in March 1996 and made a strong recovery, but became less publicly active. He made occasional appearances at UCLA games in recent years.

— Reported by the Associated Press

A three-year starter, Hazzard did become an All-American in 1963 and again in 1964, when the Bruins went 30-0 and won the first of Wooden’s 10 NCAA titles. Hazzard was named the outstanding player of the 1964 NCAA Final Four.

“Recruiting after that 1964 national championship was tremendous,” Wooden said later. “Lew Alcindor [Kareem Abdul-Jabbar] would never have come to UCLA had we not won it in 1964 and 1965.”

UCLA was also where Hazzard met his future wife, Jaleesa, who was a Bruin cheerleader.

Hazzard, attired in a sweater, shorts and sandals, was on campus one day with his roommate, tennis player Arthur Ashe, and said, “See that girl? I’m going to marry her.”

She told him, “Not if you don’t wear socks.” The two were married in May 1964. By then Hazzard’s future lay before him.

— Reported by Chris Foster of the Los Angeles Times

Former Knick and NBA coaching legend Phil Jackson, who has been rumored to be Mike D’Antoni’s replacement ever since he stepped down from the Lakers, could make a third comeback. That’s according to one of Jackson’s most prominent ex-players, Shaquille O’Neal.

O’Neal, who was in New York City on Wednesday taping a segment for Yes Network’s “CenterStage” show to promote his new book Shaq Uncut, told a small group of reporters to never rule out Jackson’s return to the bench.

“He may come back,” O’Neal said. “Phil always says he’s never coming back.”

O’Neal said Jackson “changed my NBA career,” and that lasting impact would mean something to Carmelo Anthony and Amare Stoudemire. That’s because Jackson has had plenty of experience managing and developing two superstars, and getting them to gel with each other, from Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen to O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. O’Neal credited Jackson’s scientific approach, from his demeanor to his routine, for how he became the Zen Master.

— Reported by Jared Zwerling of ESPN New York

David Stern has been active on the airwaves, the Internet and, in a new one, on Twitter, trying to tell fatigued fans and an irritated set of NBA players about the need to sign on the dotted line.

Monday is the newest “most important day” of the 138-day NBA lockout. Player representatives for all 30 NBA teams will meet in New York and determine whether they will take the latest offer from NBA owners.

A majority of responses from players and their agents indicated there would be a rejection of the proposal that promised a 72-game season starting Dec. 15.

A lot has to happen this week for there to be basketball by Christmas. Stern knows it too.

The NBA commissioner lambasted player agents in a conference call with reporters Saturday and held a 90-minute “Twitterview” with players, fans and journalists Sunday, sending some final public thoughts in 140 characters or less.

He made some intriguing points, admitting that contraction of teams was discussed by players and owners but dismissed; all NBA executives took pay cuts of unspecified proportion; and players’ contracts would become void if decertification occurred (more of a threat than anything).

— Reported by Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times