By Bill Simons

Basketball has long had a strong appeal to Jews. As players, coaches, referees, owners, promoters, pundits and fans, they have had a significant basketball presence since James Naismith invented the game at the International YMCA in Springfield, MA, in 1891. The great wave of East European Jews arrived in New York and other urban centers just as basketball emerged as the quintessential city game. Unlike baseball and football, it didn’t require much equipment or space. A compact gym or a patch of asphalt provided a sufficient setting for a game of hoops. Basketball’s frenetic pace and strategizing found eager adherents among the children of Jewish immigrants. As the game grew from playground and settlement house courts to public school, college and professional venues, the Jewish basketball profile evolved, but remained vital. Indeed, an American Jewish basketball star, Tal Brody, grew Israeli basketball.
In the first generation of the National Basketball Association, there were several star Jewish players, headlined by Dolph Schayes and Max Zaslofsky. Three Jews – Maurice Podoloff, David Stern and Adam Silver – have served as commissioner of the NBA. Two landsman named Red, Auerbach and Holzman, rank amongst the pro game’s greatest coaches. Today, Jews are more notable as NBA executives, owners and commentators than as players. However, 6’9” Portland Trail Blazer forward Deni Avdija, an Israeli native, averaged 16.9 points per game this season, giving Jews an NBA standard bearer. In the college ranks, Jewish players Blake Peters, Ben Shtolzberg, Sam Silverstein, Danny Wolf and Harrison Hochberg just concluded notable seasons. However, the most memorable achievements in 2024-25 Jewish basketball came from the coaches in the college game. 
Save for the National Football League Super Bowl, its actual play confined to a single day, the NCAA Division I men’s basketball national championship tournament – March Madness – is sport’s most hyped and compelling drama. Dominating fan attention for about a month, March Madness includes a women’s tournament that grows geometrically more significant by the year. University of Southern California coach Lindsay Gottlieb, a Northern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame inductee, made it to the women’s 2025 Elite Eight. Remarkably, on the men’s side in this season’s vaunted Final Four competition three teams were led by Jewish coaches – Jon Scheyer, Bruce Pearl and Todd Golden.
More than a sobriquet, March Madness is a state of mind. With both the men’s and women’s tournaments featuring 68 teams representing diverse regions, campuses across the country erupt in excitement. As a single-elimination tournament, every game counts. The NCAA basketball playoffs regularly witness the stunning elimination of heavy favorites and the dramatic emergence of Cinderella stories. The organization of competition around visual brackets, starting with all 68 teams and winnowing the field down game-by-game until two teams compete for the championship, makes tournament progress easy to follow. New developments, amongst them the player transfer portal, the option of moving on to the NBA before graduation, compensation for a star’s name or image, and the legalization of sports gambling, add to the drama and ubiquitous media attention attendant to the tournament. 
Coaching his alma mater, Jon Scheyer, 37, is no stranger to March Madness. As a 6’5” guard, who averaged 18.2 points during his senior year, he was a key factor in Duke winning the 2010 NCAA basketball championship under legendary coach Mike Krzyzewski. He subsequently played professional basketball in Israel for Maccabi Tel Aviv. Succeeding Krzyzewski as Duke’s head basketball coach three years ago, he notched a stellar 35-4 record during the 2024-2025 season. However, the quest by the Scheyer-led Duke for another championship ended with an upset 70-67 loss to Houston in the Final Four. 
With a combined career coaching record of 477-224 (.680 winning percentage) at Division I Milwaukee, Tennessee and Auburn, Bruce Pearl, 65, is recognized as one of this generation’s most successful and colorful college coaches. While at Tennessee, however, he ran afoul of the NCAA for an episode that began with hosting a high school prospect at a cookout and then denying it. Proud of his Jewish identity and a vocal supporter of Israel, Pearl coached the U.S. team to a gold medal in the 2009 Maccabi Games, brought his Auburn squad to Israel for a series of exhibition games in 2022 and publicly demands the release of hostages held by Hamas. Leading Auburn to a 32-6 (.842) season record, Pearl was eliminated from the 2025 tournament by a 79-73 Final Four loss to Florida, coached by his former protégé, Todd Golden, whom Pearl coached in the Maccabiah and under whom Golden was an assistant at Auburn.
In the final game of the NCAA championship tournament, Golden’s Florida Gators defeated the Houston Cougars 65-63 in a hard-fought contest. For almost all of the game – save for 64 seconds – Houston held the lead, at one juncture by 12 points, but the only score that counts is the final one. Claiming its third national title, Florida players and fans embraced the euphoria. 
A youthful 39 years old in only his third season as coach of the Gators, Golden capped at 36-4 season with college basketball’s ultimate prize, joining Nat Holman and Larry Brown in the pantheon of Jewish coaches to win a NCAA national championship. 
The title brought Golden celebrity and gold. Florida gifted Golden with a six-year, $40.5 million contract extension. Player recruitment got much easier. And the Chicago Cubs, Golden’s favorite baseball team, invited him to throw out the first pitch on May 13th. 
Kudos aside, on September 27, 2024, charges against Golden, the married father of two, were filed with University of Florida’s Title IX office. Several women made accusations of sexual harassment, including stalking, against him. The Title IX office concluded that Golden committed no offense “within a university program or activity.” However, the narrow scope of the investigation doesn’t preclude broader inquiry by another entity. 
Picking my best Jewish basketball memory of the past season is easy. My wife Nancy and I were sitting in the bleachers with son Joe and some of the grandchildren to watch a Swampscott (MA) High School basketball game. Our prime interest was to witness the debut season of granddaughter Hannah as a varsity cheerleader. Scanning the stands, Joe recognized an older fan sitting alone. It was my Uncle Alan, who, decades before, earned plaudits for his deft ball handling as a Swampscott guard. Sliding down to his row, we joined Uncle Alan. With cheerleader Hannah working the crowd, four generations of Simons rooted Swampscott to victory.