Alex Groza, Basketball Star For Kentucky, Is Dead at 68 (original) (raw)
Alex Groza, Basketball Star For Kentucky, Is Dead at 68
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- Jan. 23, 1995
Credit...The New York Times Archives
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January 23, 1995
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Alex Groza, an all-America center for the championship Kentucky basketball teams of the late 1940's and a prominent figure in the game's biggest betting scandal, died Saturday. He was 68.
The cause of death was cancer.
Groza's brother, Lou, was a Hall of Fame tackle and place-kicker who starred for the Cleveland Browns.
Alex Groza, 6 feet 7 inches, parlayed size with quickness that, combined with the outside shooting of guard Ralph Beard, gave Kentucky a virtually unstoppable one-two punch. Led by the Fabulous Five -- Groza, Beard, guard Kenny Rollins and forwards Wallace (Wah Wah) Jones and Cliff Barker -- Kentucky was the National Collegiate Athletic Association and Olympic champion in 1948 and N.C.A.A. champion in 1949.
Groza finished with 1,744 points, which topped the Kentucky career list for 15 years after he left and still ranks seventh in school history.
Groza, Beard and four other Kentucky teammates then went into the National Basketball Association as the Indianapolis Olympians. Groza was second in scoring behind George Mikan with a 23.4 and 21.7 averages in his two seasons.
Before the start of the 1952 season, Groza and Beard were caught up in the widening point-shaving scandal that was rocking college basketball. Groza, Beard and a teammate, Dale Barnstable, admitted to conspiring to shave points in return for bribes from gamblers while at Kentucky. They received suspended sentences and their professional careers ended.
Groza later became general manager and coach of the Kentucky Colonels and general manager of the San Diego Conquistadors of the American Basketball Association.
After the team moved to Houston, Groza remained in San Diego, working as a sales manager for Reynolds International until his death.
Survivors include his wife, Jean; two sons, Alex of Santee, Calif., and Lee of Louisville, Ky.; two daughters, Leslie Ineman of Carlsbad, Calif., and Lisa Bunney of San Diego; two granddaughters, and his brother.
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