Nobody can.
When you think of Phil Lumpkin, you don’t think in terms of loss:
• He teamed with Donald Smith at Roth High in the late 1960s, they arguably were the greatest backcourt duo in Ohio prep history.
• At Miami University — where former assistant coach and current RedHawks radio commentator Joe Barry called him “the best guard who ever played here” — Lumpkin had a high-scoring Hall of Fame career that drew praise from Dean Smith and curses from Bobby Knight.
• In his injury-plagued NBA career — he was a second-round pick of Portland in 1974 — he became the key figure in one of the greatest games in NBA history.
• As the basketball coach at Seattle’s O’Dea High the past 19 years, his team won five state titles.
Lumpkin missed school last week with pneumonia and Monday was found dead in his apartment. Because his weight had gone up to 340 pounds and he had sleep apnea, authorities believe his passing likely was from natural causes.
“When Phil grew up on Laurel Drive, he had a basket up on a pole in the backyard,” said his 77-year-old uncle Fred. “They played 3-on-3 on the dirt and the way Phil played, you knew it was his hoop. It’s called claiming your territory.”
He did the same at Roth and Miami.
“I remember going to Oxford once through a blizzard,” Fred said. “Miami was playing Indiana and by the time we got there, Bobby Knight already had a technical. By the half, Phil had 18 or 19 points and Knight was yelling at his guys ‘Check that SOB!’ ”
Hedric recalled Lumpkin orchestrating one of Miami’s greatest upsets, a 102-92 victory over North Carolina in Chapel Hill: “Dean Smith had this ‘run-and-jump’ defense and they tried to run and jump Phil. But he was such a great passer, they couldn’t stop him.”
There was a flash of that in Game 5 of the 1976 NBA Finals when Lumpkin — the Phoenix back-up point guard — came off the bench with his team down by 22 to the Celtics at the Boston Gardens. He slowed the pace of play, took over the game until the Suns lost in triple overtime.
Although he’s lived on the West Coast since his NBA days, he’ll be buried here. His brother Stephen is flying from his home in Paris to Seattle to begin arrangements.
“We’ll have the service at Tabernacle Baptist Church at Home Avenue and Broadway,” Fred said. “That’s where Phil was baptized. And this is where he belongs. This is his home.”
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