NBA All-Star and NBA Coach Gene Shue has died at the age of 90.


In the late 1950s and early 60s, All-Star NBA guard Gene Shue, who had turned losers into winners in 22 seasons as a professional coach, died. He was 90 years old.

NBA announced however, he did not say where or when Shue died.

Shue began his professional career playing with the former Philadelphia Warriors in 1954, when the 24-second shot clock was adopted. He took part in the NBA on a journey he embarked on with the second and even third acts for seven years.

Long after joining the Warriors as a first-round pick from Maryland, Shue has returned to town twice, being the coach of the 76ers (formerly the Syracuse Nationals) and later in the front office roles. He played twice for the Knicks. He ended his acting career with the Baltimore Bullets and later coached them in Baltimore and Washington. He coached the Clippers in San Diego and Los Angeles. He was an All-Star for the Detroit Pistons for five consecutive seasons, averaging 20 points per game twice. And in 1960, he was named NBA first-team guard alongside Boston Celtics’ Bob Cousy.

Shue was the NBA coach of the year twice, in Baltimore in 1969 and Washington in 1982, and managed the Bullets and later the 76ers who went to the NBA finals.

“I’ve never had a perfect team and I’ve always settled for less,” he told The Boston Globe in 1985. “My whole history is about taking weak teams and turning them around.”

Eugene William Shue was born on December 18, 1931, in Baltimore. When he played basketball in elementary school, the ceiling of the court was a little higher than the hoops, so he developed a line-drive foot-to-floor set kick. He averaged over 20 points per game for Maryland in his first and final seasons.

A slender 6 feet 2 inches, Shue was selected by the Warriors as the third overall pick in the 1954 NBA draft. But after six games with them, he was sold to the Knicks and spent two seasons playing a backcourt in New York. Carl Brown and Dick McGuire.

The Knicks traded Shue to the Pistons in 1956, during their final season in Fort Wayne, Ind., at a time when the NBA still included mid-size cities and travel was not a luxury.

“Every time we flew from Fort Wayne to the East Coast, we had to stop in Erie, Pennsylvania to get gas, or we’d run out of gas over the Great Lakes,” Terry Pluto said in oral history “The Long Stories” (1992), owner Fred Zollner’s DC- Reminds me of trips to 3.

Shue was an All-Star with the Detroit Pistons from 1958 to 1962. He played the last two seasons with the Knicks and Bullets, then retired averaging 14.4 points per game for 10 seasons.

He began his coaching career in 1966 when he took over the Bullets team in Baltimore, which had won 16 games the previous season. His bullets went 57-25 behind Earl Monroe in 1968-69 and unsold, Shue chose in the previous two drafts. They won the Eastern Conference championship in 1971 with a seven-game playoff victory over the NBA’s reigning champions the Knicks. However, they were swept in the finals by the Milwaukee Bucks from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Oscar Robertson.

Shue became head coach of the 76ers when asked to resurrect a team that went 9-73 in 1973. He coached them to the NBA playoff finals after Julius Erving in 1977, but lost to the Portland Trail Blazers in six games. When the 76ers started the next season 2-4, Shue was fired.

After winning 27 games as the Buffalo Braves, he became head coach of the San Diego Clippers in 1978-79. He led the Clippers to a 43-39 record, but dropped out in the middle of the following season when they were once again defeated.

Shue landed an expensive game when the Clippers faced the Bulls in Chicago in January 1980. After referee Dick Bavetta gave the Clippers a technical foul for having too many men on the court, Shue pushed him.

Commissioner Larry O’Brien fined Shue $3,500 and suspended him for one week without pay.

“I’m a mild-mannered man,” Shue said later, “but sometimes you have to stand up and defend yourself.”

Shue spent nearly six years on his second assignment after Bullets moved to Washington. He finished his coaching career in Los Angeles in 1989 after losing a season and half a basketball with the Clippers.

Their teams won 784 matches and lost 861 in total.

Shue emphasized defense as a coach.

Bullets striker “Taught the right defensive theories – overdoing the guy, helping out, doubling the ball” Gus Johnson said Pete Axthelm In “The City Game” (1970).

Information about Shue’s immediate survivors was not immediately available.

Shue returned to Philadelphia as general manager of the 76ers in July 1990.

“There is no such thing as nine lives,” he told the Philadelphia Daily News. I’ve spent 20 years in coaching and a lot can happen when you do this job. You can be fired, you can leave, but that doesn’t reflect on your abilities.”

Harold Katz, owner of the 76ers at the time, said, “Some guys survive. There are people like that who pop up all the time.”

Shue remained in the post until May 1992 and was reappointed as director of the casting staff.

He was still in his 80s – this time looking for the next NBA phenomenon as a 76er scout.



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