Emmet Clifford Birk (March 21, 1914 – November 6, 2000) was an American professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

player. He played for the

Oshkosh All-Stars The Oshkosh All-Stars were an American professional basketball team based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Founded in 1929 by Lonnie Darling, the team was a member of the National Basketball League (United States), National Basketball League, a forerunner t ...

in the National Basketball League for one game during the 1938–39 season. In college, he played for the

University of North Dakota The University of North Dakota (also known as UND or North Dakota) is a public research university in Grand Forks, North Dakota. It was established by the Dakota Territorial Assembly in 1883, six years before the establishment of the state of ...

(UND), where he won

North Central Conference The North Central Conference (NCC), also known as North Central Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, was a college athletic conference which operated in the north central United States. It participated in the NCAA's Division II. History The NCC ...

championships all three years he played. He was inducted into the UND Hall of Fame in 1977. In his post-basketball career, Birk spent five years serving in the

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. He then moved to

Whittier, California Whittier () is a city in Southern California in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County, part of the Gateway Cities. The city had 87,306 residents as of the 2020 United States census, an increase of 1,975 from the 2010 United States ...

and spent 45 years as a schoolteacher and coach.

References

1914 births 2000 deaths United States Army personnel of World War II American men's basketball players Basketball players from North Dakota Forwards (basketball) North Dakota Fighting Hawks men's basketball players Oshkosh All-Stars players People from Walsh County, North Dakota Sportspeople from Whittier, California Basketball players from Los Angeles County, California {{1910s-US-basketball-bio-stub