Red Holzman

Holzman in the 1970s
Personal information
Born	(1920-08-10)August 10, 1920 New York City, U.S.
Died	November 13, 1998(1998-11-13) (aged 78) New Hyde Park, New York, U.S.
Listed height	5 ft 10 in (1.78 m)
Listed weight	175 lb (79 kg)
Career information
High school	Franklin K. Lane (New York City)
College	Baltimore (1939–1940) CCNY (1940–1942)
Playing career	1945–1954
Position	Point guard
Number	10, 16
Coaching career	1953–1982
Career history
Playing
1945–1953	Rochester Royals
1953–1954	Milwaukee Hawks
Coaching
1953–1957	Milwaukee / St. Louis Hawks
1963–1967	Leones de Ponce
1967–1977, 1978–1982	New York Knicks
Career highlights
As player: NBA champion (1951) NBL champion (1946) 2×All-NBL First Team (1946, 1948) All-NBL Second Team (1947) NBL Rookie of the Year (1946) Third-teamAll-American –Converse (1942) As coach: 2×NBA champion (1970,1973) NBA Coach of the Year (1970) 2×NBA All-Star Game Coach (1970,1971) 3×BSN champion (1964–1966) Top 10 Coaches in NBA History Top 15 Coaches in NBA History No. 613 honored byNew York Knicks (1990)
Career BAA & NBA playing statistics
Points	2,166 (6.1 ppg)
Rebounds	344 (1.5 rpg)
Assists	721 (2.0 apg)
Stats at NBA.com
Stats atBasketball Reference
Career coaching record
NBA	696–603 (.536)
Record atBasketball Reference
Basketball Hall of Fame

William "Red"Holzman (August 10, 1920 – November 13, 1998) was an American professionalbasketball player andcoach. He is best known as thehead coach of theNew York Knicks of theNational Basketball Association (NBA) from 1967 to 1977, and again from 1978 to 1982. Holzman helped lead the Knicks to twoNBA championships in 1970 and 1973, and was inducted into theBasketball Hall of Fame in 1986.

In 1996, Holzman was named one of theTop 10 Coaches in NBA History.^[1]

William "Red" Holzman was born on August 10, 1920, on theLower East Side ofManhattan inNew York City,^[2][3][4] to Jewish immigrant parents, as the son of a Romanian mother and Russian father.^[5][6] He grew up in Brooklyn'sOcean Hill–Brownsville neighborhood^[3] and played basketball forFranklin K. Lane High School in the mid-1930s.

Holzman attended theUniversity of Baltimore and later theCity College of New York, where he played for two years until graduation in 1942. Holzman joined theUnited States Navy in the same year, and played on theNorfolk, VirginiaNaval Base team till he was discharged from the Navy in 1945.^[4]

After the Navy, Holzman joined theNBLRochester Royals, which won the NBL championship in Holzman's first season, and he was namedRookie of the Year in 1944–45.^[7] In 1945–46 and 1947–48 he was on the NBL's first All League team; in the interim year he was on its second team.^[8] Holzman stayed with the team through their move to the NBA and subsequent NBA championship in 1951.

In 1953, Holzman left the Royals and joined theMilwaukee Hawks as a player-coach, eventually retiring as a player in 1954 but continuing as the team's head coach.^[3][4]

During the 1956–1957 season, the Hawks (then inSt. Louis, Missouri) lost 19 of their first 33 games, and Holzman was fired.^[3][4]

Holzman coachedLeones de Ponce (basketball) from 1963 to 1967, winning three consecutive championships from 1964 to 1966.

After being fired by the Hawks, Holzman then became a scout for theNew York Knicks for the next ten years, till 1967, whereupon he became the team's head coach for the most part until 1982.^[3] Holzman's former player,Willis Reed, replaced him as Knicks head coach in 1977, but Holzman returned near the start of the 1978–1979 season. During this 15-year span as Knicks' coach, Holzman won a total of 613 games, including two NBA championships in 1970 and 1973.^[3]

In 1969, Holzman coached the Knicks to a then single-season NBA record18-game win streak, breaking the 17-game record first set back in 1946. For his efforts leading up to the Knicks' 1970 championship win, Holzman was named theNBA Coach of the Year for that year. He won his second NBA championship as the Knicks won the1973 NBA Finals against the Lakers.^[9] He was one of very few individuals to have won an NBA championship as both player and coach. As a coach, his final record was 696 wins and 604 losses. At the time of his retirement in 1982, he had the second most career victories as a head coach in NBA history.^[10]

In 1985, Holzman was elected into theNaismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. TheNew York Knicks have retired the number 613 in his honor, equaling the number of wins he accumulated as their head coach.^[3] He is also a member of theInternational Jewish Sports Hall of Fame^[10] and theNew York City Basketball Hall of Fame.

Holzman lived with his wife in a home they bought inCedarhurst, New York in the 1950s. Following his lengthy NBA coaching career, Holzman was diagnosed withleukemia and died atLong Island Jewish Medical Center inNew Hyde Park, New York in 1998.^[3] In 2000, a clock tower was erected in his honor at the intersection of Central Avenue and Cedarhurst Avenue in Cedarhurst as part of “Operation Downtown,” a project started byNassau County presiding officerBruce Blakeman and mayor Andy Parise.

• Source:Basketball Reference

• Source:Basketball-Reference.com

• Source:Basketball Reference

• Holzman, Red (1970).The Red Holzman Pro Basketball Guide 70-71. Aurora Publishers.OCLC 423856.
• Holzman, Red (1971).The Knicks. Dodd, Mead & Co.ISBN 978-0-396-06342-1.
• Holzman, Red; Lewin, Leonard (1973).Holzman's Basketball: Winning Strategy and Tactics (1st ed.). The Macmillan Company.ISBN 978-0-0255-3500-8.
• Holzman, Red (1974).Defense! Defense!. Warner Paperback Library.ISBN 978-0-446-78498-6.
• Holzman, Red (1980).A View from the Bench (1st ed.). W. W. Norton & Company.ISBN 978-0-393-33623-8.
• Holzman, Red (1987).Red on Red: The Autobiography of Red Holzman. Bantam Books.ISBN 978-0-553-27316-8.
• Holzman, Red (1991).Holzman on Hoops: The Man Who Led the Knicks Through Two World Championships Tells It Like It Was. Taylor Publishing Company.ISBN 978-0-878-33745-3.
• Holzman, Red; Lewin, Leonard (1993).My Unforgettable Season 1970 (1st ed.). Tor Books.ISBN 978-0-312-85453-9.

• List of select Jewish basketball players

• Zachter, Mort (2019).Red Holzman: The Life and Legacy of a Hall of Fame Basketball Coach. Sports Publishing.ISBN 978-1-683-58288-5.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toRed Holzman.

• Basketball Hall of Fame profile
• Biography of Red Holzman
• The NBA at 50: Red Holzman
• NBA statistics as player
• NBA statistics as coach
• Red Holzman atFind a Grave

• 1920 births
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