Maurice Lucas

Maurice "Luke" Lucas (February 18, 1952 – October 31, 2010) was an American professional basketball player who played in the American Basketball Association (ABA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA). He was a four-time NBA All-Star and won an NBA championship with the Portland Trail Blazers in 1977. He was named to the ABA All-Time Team.

Lucas played college basketball for the Marquette Warriors . He began his pro career with two years in the ABA with the Spirits of St. Louis and Kentucky Colonels. He then played 12 seasons in the NBA with the Trail Blazers, New Jersey Nets, New York Knickerbockers, Phoenix Suns, Los Angeles Lakers, and Seattle SuperSonics. The starting power forward on the Trail Blazers' 1976–77 championship team, he was nicknamed "the Enforcer" because of his primary role on the court, which was best exemplified in Game 2 of the NBA Finals that season.

During his career, he organized celebrity sporting events to raise awareness and money for children's care at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center, where his daughter was treated as an infant. Established in 2010, the Maurice Lucas Foundation in Tigard, Oregon, continues his legacy of supporting children's health and youth programs.

Lucas played college basketball for head coach Al McGuire with the then-Marquette Warriors for two years, leading them to the NCAA championship game in 1974. In the national semifinal game, Lucas led Marquette to a 64–51 victory over Kansas with game leading totals of 18 points, 14 rebounds, and 4 blocks. Marquette lost the title game to North Carolina State 76–64, while Lucas played the full 40 minutes of the game, leading his team with both 21 points and 13 rebounds.

In 1973, the Carolina Cougars of the American Basketball Association (ABA) obtained that league's rights to Lucas in the first round of the ABA draft. In 1974, Lucas was also selected by the Chicago Bulls of the National Basketball Association (NBA) with the 14th pick of the NBA draft. Lucas chose the ABA over the NBA, joining the Spirits of St. Louis team, which had since supplanted the Carolina Cougars in the ABA.

Lucas started his career off the bench but soon developed into a tough power forward. This became apparent early in his rookie season when during a game trading elbows with Artis Gilmore (who outsized him at 7'2 and 240 pounds), the two got into a skirmish where Gilmore wanted to punch Lucas. He missed and Lucas, who had backed up into the corner of the court, planted his feet and punched Gilmore right on the jaw that saw him go down.

During his first season, Lucas averaged 13.2 points per game, and 10 rebounds per game, and he was chosen for the 1974–75 ABA All-Rookie second team. In the 1975 ABA Playoffs, Lucas averaged 16.3 points, 14.7 rebounds, and 5 assists per game, as the Spirits advanced past the New York Nets in the first round with a 4–1 series victory before losing to the eventual champion Kentucky Colonels in the Eastern Division Finals.

On December 17, 1975, part way through his second season with the Spirits, Lucas was traded to the Kentucky Colonels in exchange for Caldwell Jones. Lucas was an ABA All-Star for the 1975–76 season, and he averaged 17.0 points and 11.3 rebounds per game. Lucas remained with the Colonels through that team's loss in the semifinals of the 1976 ABA Playoffs to the Denver Nuggets and through the ABA–NBA merger in 1976.