Pat Riley

Biography

Patrick James "Pat" Riley (born March 20, 1945) is a former American National Basketball Association player and coach and the current team president of the Miami Heat. Widely regarded as one of the greatest NBA coaches of all time, Riley has served as the head coach of five championship teams and an assistant coach to another. He most recently won the 2006 NBA Championship with the Miami Heat. Prior to his tenure in Miami, he served as head coach for the Los Angeles Lakers and the New York Knicks. He also played for the Los Angeles Lakers' championship team in 1972, bringing his personal total to seven NBA titles. He is known as "Coach Slick" and "Mr. GQ". Riley was born in Rome, New York, and raised in Schenectady. His father, Leon Riley, played 22 seasons of minor league baseball as an outfielder and first baseman, and appeared in 4 games for the 1944 Philadelphia Phillies. Riley played for Linton High School in Schenectady, New York under head coach Walt Przybylo and his assistants Bill Rapavy and Ed Catino. Linton High School's 74-68 victory over New York City's Power Memorial on December 29, 1961, is remembered mostly for its two stars: Power Memorial's Lew Alcindor (who later changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar); and his future coach with the Los Angeles Lakers, Linton's Riley. In 1991, Riley called it, "One of the greatest games in the history of Schenectady basketball." Riley was a versatile athlete in college, participating in both basketball and football. He won the title All-American. He led the 1966 University of Kentucky basketball team, coached by the legendary Adolph Rupp, to the NCAA title game, where they lost to Texas Western (now known as UTEP), a game that was dramatized in the movie Glory Road. He was selected by the San Diego Rockets in the 1st round of the 1967 NBA Draft, and was also drafted as a wide receiver by the Dallas Cowboys in the 11th round of the 1967 NFL Draft. He joined the Rockets and was later selected by the Portland Trail Blazers, in the 1970 NBA expansion draft, but immediately traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, which he helped win the 1972 NBA Finals, coming off the bench and guarding friend and legendary Laker guard Jerry West in practice. Despite this, overall, his playing career was undistinguished, as he was a perennial bench player. He retired after the 1975-76 NBA season as a member of the Western Conference champion Phoenix Suns. Riley finished his NBA playing career with a 7.4 points per game scoring average and a field-goal percentage of 41.4%.