John Ashworth "Cat" Thompson (February 10, 1906 – October 7, 1990) was an American basketball player. He won the Utah state championship with Dixie High School team and finished second in the High School National Tournament in 1925. In college, he played for 3 seasons for Montana State, during which time his team had a record of 102-11. In 1929 he won the

Helms Foundation Player of the Year The Helms Foundation College Basketball Player of the Year was an annual men's college basketball award given to the most outstanding men′s player in the United States. It was awarded by the Helms Athletic Foundation, an organization founded in ...

award and his team won Helms National Championship . He averaged 15.4 points per game when the average team scored 40 points per game. He was named

All-America The All-America designation is an annual honor bestowed upon an amateur sports person from the United States who is considered to be one of the best amateurs in their sport. Individuals receiving this distinction are typically added to an All-Am ...

in 1927, 1928, 1929 and 1930. He scored 1,539 points in 100 career college games he played. He was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1962. A 2009

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...

College Basketball Encyclopedia named Thompson "one of the five greatest college hoops players of the first half of the 20th century"

References

External links

Basketball Hall of Fame page on ThompsonCat Thompson Website provided by his family
1906 births 1990 deaths All-American college men's basketball players American men's basketball players Basketball players from Utah Montana State Bobcats men's basketball players Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame inductees People from St. George, Utah Forwards (basketball) {{1900s-US-basketball-bio-stub