The state of Michigan is well represented in this year’s College Basketball Hall of Fame class.
Former Michigan basketball coach John Beilein is being inducted into the 2022 group, along with former Detroit Pistons great Richard Hamilton, who’s being recognized for his efforts at UConn.
Beilein, who coached at U-M from 2007-19, reached the NCAA championship game twice with the Wolverines and also captured two Big Ten tournaments and regular season titles. Under his direction, U-M went 278-150 across 12 seasons.
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With prior stops at Nazareth, Le Moyne, Canisius, Richmond and West Virginia, Beilein went 754-425 in his college coaching career and is one of the only coaches in NCAA history to achieve 20-win seasons at the Division I, II, III and junior college levels.
Beilein left U-M in 2019 to become the head coach of the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, but resigned before the end of his first season. Last year, the Pistons hired Beilein as their senior player development advisor.
The former Michigan coach has also been named to this year’s Michigan Sports Hall of Fame class.
Before Hamilton donned his signature mask and helped lead the Pistons to the 2004 NBA championship, he was a first team All-American guard for UConn. He helped the Huskies win their first national title in 1999, averaging 24.2 points per game en route to being named the NCAA tournament’s Most Outstanding Player.
Hamilton was selected with the No. 7 pick in the 1999 draft by the Washington Wizards. Prior to the 2002 season, the Pistons acquired Hamilton in a trade that featured Jerry Stackhouse. The former UConn standout went on to obtain three All-Star selections and have his No. 32 jersey retired by the franchise.
Another inductee in the College Basketball’s Hall of Fame class is Jimmy Walker, who starred at Providence, averaging 20.5 points as a sophomore, 24.5 as a junior and a nation-leading 30.4 as a senior in 1966-67, outpacing Lew Alcindor. The two-time consensus All-American was the No. 1 overall pick in 1967 by the Pistons.
Walker was the father of former Fab Five and NBA star and current ESPN analyst Jalen Rose.
Larry Miller and Frank Selvy and coaches Jerry Krause and Lon Kruger are the other inductees this year.
Chandler Engelbrecht is a reporting intern at The Detroit Free Press and can be reached at CEngelbrecht@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @ctengelbrecht.