Many of us remember Red Holzman who brought the Knicks 2 championships and most here remember two other fine Knicks coaches - Pat Riley and Jeff Van Gundy. But before all of them the Knicks had a coach in Joe Lapchick who brought us 8 winning seasons.

Born in Yonkers in 1900, Lapchick is mostly remembered as a great coach of St Johns for 20 seasons. His record there was 334-130. If my memory serves me well, he was Lou Carnesecca's mentor. He won 4 NIT titles (1943, 1944, 1959, 1965) in an era when the NIT was the big tournament and the NCAA was the one that didn't matter.

He was also a successful player. He left high school to work as a machinist to help support his family. But in 1923 as a 6' 5" 185 lb center, he joined the "Original Celtics" as a center. In 1926, he joined the Cleveland Rosenblums and helped lead them to two titles. He was the first agile big man - a good passer who could out jump other big man.

His tenure as the Knicks head coach was between 1948 and 1957. His record with the Knicks was 326-247 and under his leadership, the team won Eastern Division titles in 1953 and 54.

Joe Lapchick died in 1970 after a great career as both a player (17 seasons) and a coach (30 seasons). He was a credit to his roots in the New York area.

I guess I am one of the few here who can recall the Lapchick years with the Knx and St. Johns and the knx teams of the 50s with Gallatin, Clifton, Bechtold, Braun, McGuire starting but why is he being brought up now?