After I published my book in 2022, “The G.O.A.T.: The Quest to Find the Best”, a book about the 75 best basketball players of all time, I had several “friends” tell me I should write a book about the greatest college players of all time. Since I had played and coached in college for 12 years I could offer a unique view point, they said. I began watching college basketball back in the 1950s, and in my 81-year lifetime I have seen thousands of players. I spent over 10 months researching and analyzing players for my book, and I had help with the statistics. The thought of doing all of that again, and on a bigger scale, was just not appealing to me. But with the basketball world focused on the March Madness and the Final Four I thought it might be fun to come up with a top 10 player list to go along with my top 10 team list. In my book I developed and defined the 10 criterion that guided me through my selection, and the order of the players in my top 75. My GOAT (greatest of all time) was the player that I felt excelled the most in the criteria I used. I am approaching the college players ranking using some of the same criteria; dominance during the era they played, honors, such POY (player of year), All-American awards, championships, and winning. Here is my list in order.

Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar), 1967-70, UCLA, Team Record: 88-2, 3xNCAA Champion, 3xAll-American, 2xPOY, Career Average: 26 points,15.5 rebounds

Bill Walton, 1971-74, UCLA, Team Record: 86-4, 2xNCAA Champion, 3xAll-American, 2xPOY, Career Average: 20.1 points, 16 rebounds

Ralph Sampson, 1979-83, Virginia, Team Record: 112-23, 3xAll-American, 3xPOY, Career Average: 15.5 points, 11.4 rebounds

Jerry Lucas, 1959-62, Ohio State, Team Record: 72-6, 1xNCAA Champion, 3xAll-American, 1xPOY, Career Average: 26.5 points, 17.2 rebounds

Christian Laettner, 1988-92, Duke, Team Record: 123-26, 2xNCAA Champion, 2xAll-American, 2xPOY, Career Average: 16.6 points, 8 rebounds

Bill Russell, 1953-56, San Francisco, Team Record: 69-8, 2xNCAA Champion, 2xAll-American, 2xPOY, Career average: 20 points, 20.5 rebounds

Oscar Robertson, 1957-60, Cincinnati, Team Record: 79-9, 3xAll-American, 3xPOY, Career Average: 33 points, 15 rebounds

David Thompson, 1972-75, NCST, 1974 NCAA Championship, Team Record: 79-7, 3xAll-American, 1xPOY, Career Average: 27 points, 8.2 rebounds

Larry Bird, 1976-79, Indiana St., Team Record: 81-13, 2xAll-American, 1xPOY, Career Average: 30.3 points, 13.3 rebounds

George Mikan, 1942-46, DePaul, Team Record: 62-12, 3xAll-American, 2xPOY, NIT Championship in 1945 (NIT was a bigger more prestigious tournament until the 1950s than the NCAA), Career Average: 23 points (led nation in scoring two years) The goal tending rule was changed because of Mikan.

I know there are some VERY noticeable omissions from my list but let me remind you that my criteria for these picks was based on their COLLEGE careers. I do not think that any player that played only one or two years in college deserved to be above the players I selected. Sorry, fans of Jerry West, Wayman Tisdale, Wilt Chamberlain, Shaq O’Neal, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Patrick Ewing, Len Bias, Tim Duncan, and Elvin Hayes. Perhaps the most obvious omission is Pete Maravich. “Pistol Pete” is a generational player and one of my five most entertaining players to ever play the game. He still holds the record for the most career points (men) with 3,667, an average of 44.2. He was a 3xAll-American but his LSU teams were 49-35 and did not even win a conference championship.

A footnote to this article that I originally posted in 2024. I do NOT believe any of the current college players or ANY college players going forward will ever crack the top 20 and certainly top 10 list of all-time college players because of the portal and NIL. They don’t even stay in college long enough to get recognized by their own fans. A great college player doesn’t play in college long enough to warrant a spot in the top 10 or any top list! I’m not blaming the players for leaving for the big paycheck, some should stay and keep getting the BIG paycheck they are getting at Basketball U. We all agree there has to be some rules, guidelines, and restrictions established in college sports or it is going to be NFL 2.00 and NBA 2.00.

The two greatest college basketball players of all time. Bill Walton and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Lew Alcindor) and the greatest college basketball coach of all time John Wooden.