John B. McLendon Jr. (April 5, 1915 – October 8, 1999) was an American
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...
coach who is recognized as the first
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
basketball coach at a predominantly white university and the first African American head coach in any professional sport. He was a major contributor to the development of modern basketball and coached on both the college and professional levels during his career. He has been enshrined three times in the
Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, and also inducted into the
National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame
The National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, located in Kansas City, Missouri, is a hall of fame and museum dedicated to men's college basketball. The museum is an integral portion of the College Basketball Experience created by the National ...
.
Background
Born in
Hiawatha, Kansas
Hiawatha ( Ioway: ''Hári Wáta'' pronounced ) is the largest city and county seat of Brown County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 3,280.
History
Etymology
B.L. Rider reportedly was responsible ...
, to John Blanche McLendon Sr. (June 24, 1882 –October 15, 1973), a college teacher, and Effie Katherine McLendon (née Hunn; 1886 – 1918), one of his students at
Washburn University
Washburn University (WU) is a public university in Topeka, Kansas, United States. It offers undergraduate and graduate programs, as well as professional programs in law and business. Washburn has 550 faculty members, who teach more than 6,100 ...
.
McLendon Jr. was part
African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
and part
Delaware Indian
The Lenape (, , or Lenape , del, Lënapeyok) also called the Leni Lenape, Lenni Lenape and Delaware people, are an indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands, who live in the United States and Canada. Their historical territory inclu ...
from his mother's side.
[Aaron Barnhart]
''Black Magic'': Only the lines were white
, TV Barn, March 14, 2008. Retrieved on Jan. 20, 2010. His mother died in the
1918 flu pandemic
The 1918–1920 influenza pandemic, commonly known by the misnomer Spanish flu or as the Great Influenza epidemic, was an exceptionally deadly global influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 influenza A virus. The earliest documented case was ...
which would lead to the temporary break-up of his family. John and his younger brother Arthur were sent to be with his Delaware Indian grandparents on a ranch near
Trinidad, Colorado
Trinidad is the home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Las Animas County, Colorado, United States. The population was 8,329 as of the 2020 census. Trinidad lies north of Raton, New Mexico, and s ...
while his older sister, Anita, was sent to be with an aunt in
Omaha, Nebraska
Omaha ( ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Nebraska and the county seat of Douglas County. Omaha is in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's 39th-largest cit ...
, and his younger sister, Elsie, was sent to be with other relatives, but would end up with a foster family on a ranch in
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Montana and Wyomi ...
.
John would not see his younger sister again for 45 years, but the rest of the family were reunited after his father remarried in 1921 to Minnie E. Jackson, a school teacher in
Kansas City, Missouri.
The family settled in
Kansas City, Kansas
Kansas City, abbreviated as "KCK", is the third-largest city in the U.S. state of Kansas, and the county seat of Wyandotte County. It is an inner suburb of the older and more populous Kansas City, Missouri, after which it is named. As of ...
, where John would first go to Dunbar Elementary School and later
Sumner High School.
John became enamored with the sport of basketball while on a field trip from Dunbar Elementary to the new Northeast Junior High School
in Kansas City, Kansas, where he saw his first official basketball court. He soon became an all-around athlete at Sumner High School and chose basketball as his favorite sport, although he failed to make the basketball team at Sumner. Instead, he lettered in gymnastics and was the basketball team manager.
After high school, he first attended
Kansas City Kansas Junior College where he finally made the basketball team.
The team went undefeated, although John only played sparingly. After one year at Kansas City Kansas Junior College he then transferred to the
University of Kansas
The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. T ...
, where he learned the intricacies of basketball from the sport's inventor,
Dr. James Naismith
James Naismith (; November 6, 1861November 28, 1939) was a Canadian-American physical educator, physician, Christian chaplain, and sports coach, best known as the inventor of the game of basketball. After moving to the United States, he wrote ...
, who was the athletic director at the school.
However, McLendon was not permitted to actually play college basketball, as the KU varsity team was
segregated and would not suit up its first black player until 1951.
Career
He went on to become a successful high school and college coach, at schools such as North Carolina College for Negroes (now
North Carolina Central University
North Carolina Central University (NCCU or NC Central) is a public historically black university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by James E. Shepard in affiliation with the Chautauqua movement in 1909, it was supported by private funds from ...
),
Hampton Institute (now University), Tennessee A&I (now
Tennessee State University
Tennessee State University (Tennessee State, Tenn State, or TSU) is a public historically black land-grant university in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1912, it is the only state-funded historically black university in Tenness ...
),
Kentucky State College (now University) and
Cleveland State University. In his early years, his teams were restricted to playing only against other all-black teams. However, while coaching at North Carolina College for Negroes, McLendon participated in "The Secret Game", a match against a team from
Duke University, which was the first collegiate basketball contest where blacks and whites competed on the same floor. He led the Eagles to eight
CIAA Championships (1941, 1943–44, 1946–47, 1949–50, 1952). McLendon's teams were credited with increasing the pace of the game of basketball from the slow tempo of its early years to the faster tempo that prevails today. At Cleveland State, he was the first African American head coach of a predominantly white university.
He was a three-time winner of the
NAIA Coach of the Year award and won three consecutive NAIA championships at Tennessee State, making him the first college basketball coach ever to have won three consecutive national titles.
McLendon also coached professionally on two occasions.
Cleveland Pipers
The Cleveland Pipers were an American industrial basketball team based in Cleveland, Ohio in the 1950s and early 1960s. The Pipers are mostly known for having played in the short-lived American Basketball League from 1961–62. They were also a p ...
General Manager Mike Cleary hired him in 1962 to be the head coach of the
American Basketball League team which was owned by
George Steinbrenner
George Michael Steinbrenner III (July 4, 1930July 13, 2010) was an American businessman who was the principal owner and managing partner of Major League Baseball's New York Yankees from 1973 until his death in 2010. He was the longest-serving own ...
. McLendon's hiring made history, as he became the first African American head coach in professional sports. In his, and the Pipers', only season in the ABL, partway through the season he quit or was fired (sources differ). McLendon was replaced as coach by
Bill Sharman of the recently defunct
Los Angeles Jets
The Los Angeles Jets were an American basketball team based in Los Angeles, California, founded by Jack Blanck and Len Corbosiero, that was a member of the American Basketball League in the league's 1961–62 season.
History
The American Basketba ...
of the ABL; under Sharman, the team completed the season and won the league championship. McLendon went on to coach the
American Basketball Association's
Denver Rockets
Denver () is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States#State capital, capital, and List of municipalities in Colorado#, most populous city of th ...
(which later became the
Denver Nuggets of the
NBA) in 1969, although he was fired after the team started the season 9-19. Despite the fact that he was only 54 when dismissed, this was the last college or professional head coaching job in his career.
McLendon's contributions to the game of basketball include the invention of the
fast break
Fast break is an offensive strategy in basketball and handball. In a fast break, a team attempts to move the ball up court and into scoring position as quickly as possible, so that the defense is outnumbered and does not have time to set up. The ...
,
full-court press
A full-court press is a basketball term for a defensive style in which the defense applies pressure to the offensive team the entire length of the court before and after the inbound pass. Pressure may be applied man-to-man, or via a zone press us ...
and
four corners offense
The four corners offense, technically four corner stall, is an offensive strategy for stalling in basketball. Four players stand in the corners of the offensive half-court while the fifth dribbles the ball in the middle. Most of the time the point ...
.
Recognition
Like Naismith, McLendon was inducted into the
Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1979 as a "
contributor". He was, however, selected in 2007 for the second entering class of the
National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame
The National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, located in Kansas City, Missouri, is a hall of fame and museum dedicated to men's college basketball. The museum is an integral portion of the College Basketball Experience created by the National ...
for his coaching achievements. He was also inducted into the Cleveland State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2007, where his wife Joanna accepted the award on his behalf.
On April 4, 2016, McLendon was announced as an inductee of the Naismith Hall again, this time as a coach. He was formally inducted in this role on September 9 of that year.
A biography of John B. McLendon, ''Breaking Through: John B. McLendon, Basketball Legend and Civil Rights Pioneer'', by Milton S. Katz, was published in 2007. McLendon's coaching legacy is also chronicled in the documentary ''Black Magic'', which originally aired as a two-part series on ESPN in March 2008.
The
National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics The National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA) is a professional organization for college and university athletic directors in the United States. NACDA boasts a membership of more than 6,100 individuals and more than 1,600 ins ...
sponsors the John McLendon Minority Scholarship Foundation, which offers postgraduate scholarships to minority students studying athletics administration. The foundation was formed under the directorship of Mike Cleary, who hired McLendon as head coach of the Cleveland Pipers in 1962 as the first African American head coach in professional sports.
Beginning in 2016, a first-round game in the
CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament
The CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament (CIT) was an American men's college basketball postseason tournament founded by Collegeinsider.com. The tournament was oriented toward schools that did not get selected for the NCAA Division I men's ...
involving a
HBCU team would be known as the Coach John Mclendon Classic.
He was the 2021 recipient of the NCAA
Theodore Roosevelt Award
The Theodore Roosevelt Award is the highest honor the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) may confer on an individual. The award is awarded annually to a graduate from an NCAA member institution who earned a varsity letter in college fo ...
.
Head coaching record
Notes and references
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:McLendon, John
1915 births
1999 deaths
African-American basketball coaches
American Basketball League (1961–62) coaches
American men's basketball coaches
Basketball coaches from Kansas
Cleveland State Vikings men's basketball coaches
College men's basketball head coaches in the United States
Denver Rockets head coaches
Hampton Pirates men's basketball coaches
Kentucky State Thorobreds basketball coaches
Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees
National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame inductees
North Carolina Central Eagles men's basketball coaches
People from Hiawatha, Kansas
Tennessee State Tigers basketball coaches
University of Kansas alumni
20th-century African-American sportspeople