Connie Hawkins

Nickname: "The Hawk"
Ht. 6-8
Wt. 215
College - Iowa
ABA Teams: Pittsburgh (1967-68) & Minnesota (1968-69)

First ABA MVP in 67-68. First ABA Scoring Leader in 67-68 with 26.8 ppg average. 2-Time Member of ABA All-Pro Team. Second in scoring in 68-69 at 30.2 ppg. Member of 67-68 First ABA Championship Team with the Pittsburgh Pipers. Member of the Basketball Hall of Fame.

From Jim O'Brien's 1972-73 Complete Handbook of Pro Basketball:
His move to the basket is unstoppable, his hands are so big and he has such control of the ball . . . Connie isn't consistent, but when he's hot, he's hot, he's hot . . . "He handles the ball like a guard," says Billy Cunningham of the 76ers, once a schoolboy opponent in Brooklyn . . . "He has the biggest hands I've ever seen," said Dave DeBusschere.  "He handles a basketball as though it was a baseball.  He doesn't run, he floats.   Inside, he's one of the best scorers in the game." . . . His humor borders on the ironic.   In a questionnaire he answered the following:  What were the honors you won in college? with "I won the honor to leave." . . . Hawkins was a man caught in a dilemma not of his own making when the last college scandal broke during his freshman year at Iowa . . . It ended his college career and sent him to the ABL, the Harlem Globetrotters, and the ABA before he brought suit successfully against the NBA and played for the Phoenix Suns. . . Subject of engrossing book by David Wolf called "Foul!" (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc.).  Read it.  May be best book on basketball ever written, and there's too much to Hawkins' history to capsulize here . . . When Bill Russell picked all-time all-pro team, The Hawk was on his second-five selection.  "If he hadn't got such a bad deal," Russell remarked, "you would mention Hawkins with Baylor and Pettit."
GP Min FGM FGA FG% 3PM 3PA 3P% FTM FTA FT% TReb AST PF Stl Blk Pnts RPG APG PPG
Career ABA Totals 117 4998 1131 2194 .515 5 31 .161 1028 1343 .765 1479 504 414 - - 3295 12.6 4.3 28.2
ABA Playoff Totals 21 936 210 416 .505 4 8 .500 169 239 .707 258 91 83 - - 593 12.3 4.3 28.2
ABA All-Star Totals 1 26 3 6 .500 0 0 .000 1 3 .333 9 2 3 - - 7 9.0 2.0 7.0

 

 

During the 1968-69 season, the Minnesota Pipers used Connie Hawkins as a "human billboard." The back of Hawkins' warmup jacket looked like a giant resume--it was plastered with Hawkins' 1967-68 post-season awards and a giant red, white and blue ABA basketball. Needless to say, Hawkins' teammates gave him a hard time about the jacket. Hawkins finally became so exasperated that he purposely "lost" the jacket during a road trip to Dallas. (photos courtesy of Dick Engelberg)


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