Jul
14
The notion that looks can be deceiving certainly applies when comparing David Thompson and Spud Webb, a pair of former North Carolina State guards who shared birthdays yesterday.
While these two former guards may be linked by the same birth day and university, it is ultimately the most individually artistic play in all of basketball — the slam dunk – that is the most common bond shared by these two men, despite their drastic differences in height.
Once able to jump 48” off his 6’4’’ frame, Thompson — who turned 54 on July 13 — was nicknamed the “Skywalker” for his ability to do what else but get up and slam the ball.
At 5’7’’, Webb – who turned 45 on Sunday – may have been the third shortest player in NBA history, but that didn’t limit his amazing ability to rise to the rim.
Just ask his former Atlanta Hawks’ teammate Dominique Wilkins, whom Webb defeated in the finals of the 1986 Slam Dunk Contest, which was easily the defining highlight in the guard’s very respectable 12-year career.
Dunkers with a different style but equal effectiveness, here are some interesting tidbits that you might not have known about Thompson and Webb when its came to their fulfilling relationships with the slam-jam-thank-you-mam.
• Generally considered to be the greatest player in the history of the ACC by many college basketball historians, Thompson is credited, along with former college teammate and current Wolfpack assistant coach Monte Towe, for inventing the alley-oop, a play that Chris Paul and Tyson Chandler of the New Orleans Hornets currently have down to a science.
• Despite being the inventor of the oop, Thompson was not allowed to dunk when he played for N.C. State in the mid-seventies as the NCAA had banned the dunk in the mid-sixties to even the playing field against UCLA’s Lew Alcindor.
• Thompson dunked the ball only once in his career at N.C. State, during a fast-break in a 1975 game against UNC-Charlotte. Thompson’s dunk was immediately discredited as it was a violation of the rules, and North Carolina State was hit with a technical foul.
• Thompson – whom Michael Jordan said was his boyhood basketball idol and once admitted that N.C. State and not his alma mater, North Carolina, was his favorite team as a child because of Thompson – competed in the ABA’s first ever slam dunk contest back in 1976. A member of the Denver Nuggets, Thompson lost to Julius Erving of the New Jersey Nets when the Dr. pulled out the famous free-throw line dunk that Jordan would replicate years later in the 1987 Slam Dunk Contest.
• Webb reportedly first dunked a basketball during his senior year of high school.
• According to Webb, his Atlanta teammate Wilkins had never seen him dunk prior to the 1986 dunk contest. Imagine Wilkins’ surprise when Webb pulled out this assortment of dunks.
• Wilkins, the 1985 dunk contest winner, would be defeated by Webb in 1986 when the diminutive guard scored a perfect score of 50 from all three judges on each of his two dunks in the finals.
chris@hoops4thesoul.com
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