Remembering Connie Hawkins on What Would Have Been His 83rd Birthday
- Jake C
- Jul 17
- 7 min read
Cover photo: Connie Hawkins against the New York Knicks on February 16, 1971. Photo credit: Robert Kradin, Associated Press.
A New York City basketball legend would have turned 83 years today, July 17.
Cornelius Hawkins was born on this date in Brooklyn in 1942. “The Hawk”, one of the first players with high flying ability and over mitts for hands, was and is a staple of New York City ball. Need proof? Kareem Abdul-Jabbar once said that Hawkins was one of the fifteen best players he ever shared a court with.
After starring at Boys High in Brooklyn - the same school that produced future Hall of Fame guard Lenny Wilkens - Connie Hawkins was to be a star at the University of Iowa. But a point-shaving scandal in his freshman year, for which he was wrongfully implicated, prevented him from potentially continuing his high school success - that had revealed itself in the form of two city championships for Boys - at Iowa.
The scandal led to Iowa disassociating itself with Hawkins, who had no chance of being offered a scholarship at any other school. The NBA did not want to associate with him, either.
“They (the league) had nothing to substantiate putting this blacklist on him,” said Hall of Fame columnist Peter Vecsey in an October 2017 interview with Robert Seigel a week after Hawkins’ passing. “He had nothing. They (his mom, kids) were always out, finagling for money. Went to bed many times hungry. There’s no doubt about that. There was a lot to overcome.”
But overcome things Hawkins did. He was 19 years old in 1961 when he signed to play for the Pittsburgh Rens of the American Basketball League. He won the league’s Most Valuable Player award in 1962. He went unselected in the 1964 NBA Draft, the same draft that saw Willis Reed and Paul Silas get chosen. Hawkins also went undrafted in the following two drafts, and in 1966 was officially banned from the NBA.
From 1963-1967, Hawkins was a Harlem Globetrotter. Following his years there, Hawkins was cleared, by ABA Commissioner George Mikan, of any wrongdoing in the scandal, and the 25-year-old made his ABA debut with the Pittsburgh Pipers on October 23, 1967. That season, Hawkins led the ABA in scoring at 26.8 points per game (51.9% shooting) with 13.5 rebounds and 4.6 assists in 44.9 minutes per game. He was named league MVP, and the Pipers won the championship.
The franchise moved to Minnesota for the 1968-69 season, and Hawkins’ stellar play moved north with the club, despite him appearing in just 47 games as he dealt with a knee injury. The 26-year-old again averaged a mighty double-double, of 30.2 points and 11.4 rebounds. He shot 51.1% for the field, making 10.6 attempts per game on average, and averaged 39.4 minutes per game. He finished second in MVP voting.
In 1969, Hawkins and the NBA settled his $6 million antitrust case against the league. Because the league feared (by potentially losing the case) that a loss would not allow them to ban players who actually did gamble, the NBA lifted its ban on Hawkins. As part of the $1.3 million settlement was also a contract of $410,000 over five years.
Hawkins’ rights were awarded to the expansion Phoenix Suns. He immediately made himself known on a team that also included Hall of Fame guard Gail Goodrich and the rugged inside force that was Silas.
Connie Hawkins' First Four NBA Seasons
1969-70: 24.6 points, 10.4 rebounds, 4.8 assists, 49.0% FG, 17.9 attempts, 40.9 minutes, 81 games, 5th in MVP voting, 1st team All-NBA, All-Star. On March 29. 1970, he scored a career-high 44 points against the Houston Rockets.
1970-71: 20.9 points, 9.1 rebounds, 4.5 assists, 43.4% FG, 16.6 attempts, 37.5 minutes, 71 games, All-Star
1971-72: 21.0 points, 8.3 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 45.9% FG, 16.4 attempts, 36.8 minutes, 76 games, All-Star. On January 20, 1972, he scored 40 points against the New York Knicks, the second 40-point game of his career.
1972-73: 16.1 points, 8.5 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 47.9% FG, 12.3 attempts, 36.9 minutes, 79 games, All-Star
To open the 1973-74 season, Hawkins played eight games with the Suns (11.3 points, 5.4 rebounds, 48.6% FG, 27.9 minutes). On October 30, 1973, he was dealt to the Los Angeles Lakers for Keith Erickson and the No. 2 selection in the 1974 draft. Hawkins averaged 12.8 points, 7.4 rebounds, and 5.3 assists on 50.2% shooting (10.3 shots) in 35.7 minutes per game for the remainder of the ‘73-’74 season (71 games) for the Lakers. In 1974-75, he suited up 43 times and averaged 8.0 points in 23.9 minutes per game. Hawkins played 74 games in his final pro season of 1975-76 as an Atlanta Hawk, averaging 8.2 points and 6.0 rebounds in 25.8 minutes.
Combining his ABA and NBA years, Hawkins played nine professional seasons, not including his 1961-62 stint with the American Basketball League's Rens. In those nine ABA and NBA seasons, he played 616 games and averaged 18.7 points, 8.8 rebounds, and 4.1 assists on 47.9% shooting (14 attempts) in 36.1 minutes per game. He only played seven NBA seasons, unquestionably the result of the erroneous lawsuit that robbed him of playing the league in his early 20s. In the NBA, he played 499 games and averaged 16.5 points, 8.0 rebounds, and 4.1 assists (46.7% shooting, 12.9 attempts, 34.5 minutes). He was named an all-star in his career a total of six times, twice in the ABA and four times in the NBA.
In his first five pro seasons in both leagues, when he was at or exceeded sixteen shot attempts per game, he averaged over 20 points and 10 rebounds per game. His rebounding was particularly impressive for a player that stood 6 foot, 8 inches in an era that still had its share of traditional big men. His two seasons with the Pilots yielded 28.2 points, 12.6 rebounds, and 4.3 assists (117 games, 42.7 minutes, 18.8 attempts, 51.5% shooting), and in his five seasons with the Suns he produced 20.5 points, 9.0 rebounds, and 4.3 assists on average (311 games, 37.8 minutes, 15.6 attempts, 46.6% shooting).
“He was way ahead of his time in the things he did with the ball, above the rim,” said Vecsey in the same October 2017 interview mentioned above. “He had these enormous hands. I used to say his hands were so big they could Palm Sunday. He had such extension cords for arms that when he got up in the air he just put his arm out with the ball in one hand.” Vecsey has said in the past that Dave Wolf’s Foul! The Connie Hawkins Story is the greatest sports book ever written.
Julius Erving counts Hawkins as the guy who inspired him in the sport, revealing such in his 2013 documentary The Doctor, and referring to the grip that Hawkins had for a hand that allowed him to effortlessly control the basketball. Hawkins was “The Hawk” and Erving’s playground nickname started out as “The Claw” due to his own large hands. Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown said that Hawkins was “Julius before Julius and Michael before Michael.” Also said Brown at one time, “I tell everybody this. Connie Hawkins at 17 and 18 might have been as good a player as any 17 or 18-year-old ever.”
Rick Telander, longtime columnist of the Chicago Sun-Times, touts Hawkins - while speaking in a Brooklyn Nets’ series Basketball’s Borough when he talks about NYC legends Wilkens, Earl “The Goat” Manigault, Herman “The Helicopter” Knowings, and Rodney Parker - as legendary.
Said Hawkins’ fellow Boys alum Wilkens at one time, also revealed in Basketball’s Borough: “Connie, I mean he could take that ball like I said and just twirl it around his head and put it up on the other side of the basket. Everybody knew that he was gonna to be a star, that he was gonna be an incredible player. He was unselfish, he could run, he could jump, he could block shots. He was just an incredible player.”
Billy Cunningham, a Brooklyn native himself who became a Hall of Famer due to his production with the Philadelphia 76ers, said of Hawkins in the same program: “He was so gifted. The game was so easy to him. At a young age, looking back, you know, ego was never an issue with him. He would rather make a nice pass or a simple pass than score two points.”
Hall of Fame forward Spencer Haywood, as told to NBA.com’s Steve Ashburner in a memorial piece following Hawkins’ passing, said that the Hawkins that arrived in the NBA in ‘69 “was a mother******”, an emphatic, flattering way to describe the talents of the Hawk. Haywood said that Hawkins “was an outstanding ballplayer” who used his creative skills learned as a Globetrotter and his experience in the ABL and ABA to enhance his NBA game.
Rick Barry was another Hall of Famer to pour praise on Hawkins, saying to Ashburner that, after Elgin Baylor, the next guy to showcase skills never before seen in basketball was Hawkins, like his ability with one hand and his tomahawk jams. “He was one of those guys who was a real showman, able to do things most players couldn’t do.” Barry also says in the piece that Hawkins was a “very fun guy, an interesting guy to be around.”
With his humungous hands, Hawkins was indeed able to do special things, like wave the ball around as if it were a loaf of bread. A lot of the ball fakes Jordan did later on, Hawkins did in his day. Like Jordan and later Kawhi Leonard, Hawkins’ ability to palm the ball allowed him to maneuver and operate in ways that others could not. Like facing up and moving the ball from side to side behind his back as if it were a tennis ball, and then bringing the ball behind his back right to left before making a move to the basket. Like taking the ball in his right hand on a drive and lofting a hook shot over Abdul-Jabbar, as if Hawkins himself was a 7 foot 2, not 6 foot 8.
Former Suns’ General Manager Jerry Colangelo to Ashburner said that Hawkins was the player that put the Suns' franchise on the map, while going on to say that Hawkins, while charismatic, had a quality of humility to him.
Vecsey was a voter for the NBA’s Top 75 team that was released in October 2021. One of the names he identified as worthy of a spot? The Hawk.
In 1992, Hawkins was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
Later in life, Hawkins lived in Phoenix and worked in community relations for the organization that gave him his NBA chance. On October 6, 2017, he died of cancer.
On his birthday, we remember him.
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