Attucks legend Oscar Robertson to receive NBA’s Lifetime Achievement Award

NEW YORK (AP) — Hall of Famer Oscar Robertson — who played at Indianapolis Crispus Attucks High School — will be honored with the NBA’s Lifetime Achievement Award at the NBA Awards on June 25. 

Attucks High School’s basketball team in 1955 became the first all-black school in the nation to win a state title. Robertson, also known as the “The Big O,” led Attucks to back-to-back state titles. 

Robertson is the career leader with 181 triple-doubles and the first player to average one for a season. He was the NBA’s Rookie of the Year in 1961, MVP in 1964 and won a championship with Milwaukee in 1971. The guard was a nine-time selection to the All-NBA first team and was voted one of the league’s 50 greatest players. 

He also was co-captain of the 1960 U.S. team that won an Olympic gold medal and led Crispus Attucks High School to consecutive Indiana state championships, the first all African-American team in the nation to win a state title. 

Robertson also was president of the National Basketball Players Association from 1965-74, and the settlement of his anti-trust lawsuit against the NBA — known as the Oscar Robertson Rule — ushered in free agency in the league. 

Bill Russell won the award last year in the first season of the awards show.