Bernard King

For the Australian television personality, see Bernard King (television).

Bernard King (born December 4, 1956 in Brooklyn, New York) is a retired American professional basketball player at the small forward position in the NBA and one of the NBA's all-time greatest scorers. He played all or part of 14 seasons with the New Jersey Nets (1977–1979), Utah Jazz (1979-80), Golden State Warriors, (1981–1982), New York Knicks (1983–1987), and the Washington Bullets (1987–1992; 1993).

NBA career

Bernard King attended college at the University of Tennessee and was selected 7th overall in the 1977 NBA Draft by the New York Nets, who months later relocated from New York to New Jersey and became known as the New Jersey Nets.

At 6'7" and 205 pounds, Bernard King epitomized the NBA small forward of the 1980s. While arguably not as explosive as many of his peers, King was known as a tremendous scorer, leading the NBA in scoring in 1985 with 32.9 points per game. He was twice selected to the All-NBA First Team and three times to the NBA All-Star Game.

In 1977-78, his rookie season, he set a New Jersey Nets franchise record for most points scored in a season with 1,909, at 24.2 points per game. He would later surpass this record with his 2,027 point season in '83-84, earning the first of his back-to-back All-NBA First Team selections.

On January 31, 1984, as a Knick, King made history by becoming the first player since 1964 to score at least 50 points in consecutive games: scoring 50 points on 20 for 23 shooting with 10 free throws in a 117-113 Knicks victory over the San Antonio Spurs on January 30, and following it up with another 50 point performance in another road victory - this time in a 105-98 win over the Dallas Mavericks - on 20 for 28 shooting and 10 free throws. The next season, on Christmas day, 1984, King lit up the New Jersey Nets for 60 points, becoming just the tenth player in NBA history to score 60 or more points in a single game.

At the peak of his career, however, King suffered a devastating knee injury - a torn anterior cruciate ligament after an awkward heavy fall in his right knee against the then-Kansas City Kings in Kansas City, Missouri on March 23, 1985. It required major reconstruction, causing King to miss all of the 1985-86 season and all but the final six games of the 1986-87 campaign. Despite averaging 22.7 points per game during his first six games back, it was clear that King's explosiveness was diminished, and this prompted the New York Knicks to release him at the end of the 1987 season. However, King would have a very successful comeback with the Washington Bullets, improving his scoring average each year with the squad and returning to the All-Star Game one last time in 1991, his final full season in the NBA. After a year-and-a-half hiatus and a brief 32-game stint with the New Jersey Nets at the end of the '93 season, knee problems forced Bernard King into retirement. King retired with 19,665 points in 874 games, for an average of 22.5 points per game during his career. At the time of his retirement, King ranked 16th on the all-time NBA scoring list. He is, as of February 2007, ranked 22nd.

Career accomplishments

• Bernard King's career point total of 19,665 ranks him 31st in total scoring in NBA history, as of September 2006. Of the 30 players with more career points, only George Gervin, Bob Pettit and Elgin Baylor played fewer games than King.
• His 32.9 points per game average in '84-85 is the 21st highest single-season scoring average of all time.
• His career scoring average of 22.5 points per game is the 23rd highest all time, as of May 2006.
• Bernard King is currently 28th on the all-time field goals made list, with 7,830.
• One of 19 NBA players to score 60 or more points in one game.
• Recorded eight games of scoring 50 or more points.

Awards and recognition

On February 13, 2007, Bernard King's number 53 was retired at the halftime of the Tennessee-Kentucky men's college basketball Game in Knoxville, Tennessee. The late 70s Tennessee men's basketball team was known as the "Ernie and Bernie Show" (in reference to Ernie Grunfeld and King) and is viewed as the golden age of UT men's basketball. During an ESPN interview after halftime, King stated he had not returned to Knoxville in more than 30 years, but expressed his sincere appreciation to the University and his plans to return again. King's ceremony punctuated an 89-85 Tennessee victory over the visiting Wildcats.

During the 2006 NBA All-Star Game, a panel of basketball analysts for the TNT network selected Bernard King as one of the "Next 10", a list of 10 unofficial additions to the NBA's 50 greatest players list in honor of the NBA's 60th anniversary.

In 2004, King was nominated for election into the Basketball Hall Of Fame. However, he has not yet been elected. Some say his candidacy is handicapped by the relatively small number of games he played (874) and the abundance of high-scoring small forwards of the era such as Dominique Wilkins and Alex English, as well as Adrian Dantley and Mark Aguirre, both of whom who are not hall-of-famers as well.

On August 12, 1994, King was charged with Third-Degree Assault and was freed following his arrest for allegedly choking a woman who woke him up at his Manhattan apartment. He was charged with third-degree assault, given a desk appearance ticket and released.The woman, 22, was treated for bruises on her neck at New York Hospital.

Notes

• Bernard's younger brother, guard/forward Albert, spent nine years in the NBA between 1981 and 1992, playing for the New Jersey Nets, Philadelphia 76ers, San Antonio Spurs, and Washington Bullets.

Bernard King in popular culture

• Bernard King appeared in a 1979 comedy film called Fastbreak playing "Hustler." King also played a memorable role in the 1980s television series Miami Vice, playing "Matt Ferguson", the son of a powerful local judge (played by former NBA superstar Bill Russell ) in an episode called "The Fix". In the episode, the character's father is in gambling debt, forcing him to consider "fixing" a basketball game.
• In FOX television series, The X-Files, main character Fox Mulder (played by David Duchovny), experiences a flashback scene in the episode "Little Green Men", in which his younger sister Samantha is abducted by extra-terrestrials while the two of them are in the lounge room of their home. In the scene, the twelve-year-old Mulder can be seen wearing a replica #30 Bernard King New York Nets jersey. However, to keen-eyed basketball fans, this is an anachronism. It is established that Mulder was born in the year 1961, and at age twelve, that would have placed the storyline's incident in around 1973 — four years before King entered the league.
• Name is mention in the popular rap anthem "Basketball" by Kurtis Blow
• His New York Knicks jersey is worn in the HBO series Entourage. Doug Ellin mentions that King is one of his basketball idols and that he had the jersey specially made.

See Also

• List of Individual NBA Scoring Champions

External links

• NBA stats @ basketballreference.com
• Bernard King bio @ NBA.com
• "The Incandescent King" @ nytimes.com
• UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE RETIRES BERNARD KING'S NUMBER @ UTsports.com