Rick Mount
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Richard Carl (Rick) Mount (born January 5, 1947 in Lebanon, Indiana) is a former American basketball player in the American Basketball Association (ABA).[1]
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[edit] Early life
Rick Mount's father was an avid basketball player, who intended for Rick to learn the game as well. He cut the bottom of a coffee can out and Rick would shoot tennis balls through it. His first time playing with an official basketball goal was during the fourth grade, when he began his basketball playing. He was known to beat 8th and 9th graders. When it was time to try out for the school basketball team, he wasn't able to do a standard lay up, so that very night he practiced for hours until he had it down. The next day of tryouts, he made the team. During the summers, he worked as a lifeguard. Every other hour he would practice his basketball skills, even paying kids ice cream money to rebound for him.
[edit] High school career
Rick "the Rocket" Mount attended Lebanon High School in Lebanon. There, he led his team in scoring, including 33.1 ppg throughout his junior and senior seasons. His game started to attract national attention. Mount appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated in 1966.
[edit] College career
After a great high school basketball career at Lebanon, Rick attended Purdue University, in West Lafayette, Indiana. Mount, as a freshman, was unable to play on the varsity basketball team, due to NCAA regulations then in effect not allowing freshmen to play on the varsity level. Throughout his career at Purdue (1966-1970), Rick led the Boilermakers, averaging more than 30 ppg,(he was playing when the 3 point line had not been introduced to basketball yet) and was a 3 time All-American. In 1969, he led the Purdue Boilermakers men's basketball team to the national championship game, losing to UCLA. In 1970, his senior year, Rick had two 53-point games, and one 61-point game, which was an NCAA Division 1 single-game record at the time. Later research found that if the three-point line had existed in 1970, he would have scored 74 points in that game.[2]
[edit] Professional career
Mount was considered an excellent professional prospect, but because the general managers of the NBA knew that Mount was already signed by the ABA, he was not drafted until the middle of the 8th round of the 1970 NBA Draft.[3] Mount was, however, drafted in the ABA by the Indiana Pacers as an early pick in 1970.[4] As a result, his legendary status in Indiana made it a foregone conclusion that he would sign with the Indiana Pacers of the rival ABA. At the time, the ABA was the only professional league that featured a three-point line, which worked to Mount's advantage, as he was an outside shooter. He led the league in three-point shooting during most of the 5 seasons he played and averaged 11+ ppg.
Mount never became the star in the professional ranks that he was in college. This was partly due to his inability to create scoring opportunities for himself. Mount was primarily a "spot-up" shooter who needed picks and screens from teammates to get open shots. Also, his quiet demeanor was the exact opposite of that of then Pacers' coach Slick Leonard. Leonard favored Mount's Purdue teammate Billy Keller, partly because Keller had a similar personality. Injuries also took their toll on Mount's career as well. Other teams he played for were the Utah Stars, Memphis Sounds and the Kentucky Colonels.
According to Charley Rosen, Mount displayed the most astounding exhibition of pure, one-on-none shooting he has ever saw. Rosen was invited by the Utah Star's coach, Joe Mullany, to participate in an intra-squad scrimmage. After Mullany officially terminated the session, several players lingered to play HORSE. Because of Mount, the Stars' rules for this popular shot-matching game were unique. Shots had to be perfectly clean, every make counted if and only if the ball didn't hit the rim. Despite this wrinkle (or perhaps because of it), Mount won every game. Finally, only Mount and Rosen were left on the court, and Mount was able to adjust the trajectory of every jumper so that the ball hit the inner part of the backside-rim in such a way that the ball would nudge the iron, split the net, and then bounce back to him. He could do this about 90 percent of the time.[5]
Today, Rick Mount lives in his hometown of Lebanon, Indiana, just northwest of Indianapolis, where he runs a basketball shooting instructional school.
Quotes: Mount once told a group of high school coaches, "If i can see the basket, I can make it every time...if I can't, well, 50% of the time."
[edit] References
- ^ Rick Mount. Retrieved on 21 January 2007.
- ^ Purdue Official Athletic Site
- ^ 1970 NBA Draft on Basketballreference.com
- ^ 1970 ABA Draft Pick Transactions
- ^ FOX Sports on MSN - NBA - Celtics lacking at point guard, defense
[edit] Sources
Jeff Washburn, Tales from Indiana High School Basketball (Sports Publishing 2004).
