Global basketball royalty came to Dallas on Tuesday to pay respects to a good ol’ boy from East Texas.
Yao Ming came from China. Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler and Calvin Murphy were among the large contingent from Houston.
There were more basketball hall of famers per square foot at Wilshire Baptist Church than anywhere else on the planet outside of Springfield, Mass.
They came to honor the life of Carroll Dawson, who not only was as Texan as they come but also a basketball legend in the state where he made his lifelong home and touched and influenced just about everybody who played or coached here.
“CD,” as he was known in the basketball world, was universally loved. His funeral service drew a significant Mavericks’ connection, including Del Harris, who worked for the organization for two decades and helped lead the Rockets to the NBA Finals in 1981 with Dawson as his assistant. Former Mavs’ general manager Donnie Nelson was there, too.
Everybody knew CD, who was born in Alba, was a standout player in the 1950s at Baylor, coached the Bears, worked for the Dallas Cowboys, then became a fixture with the Houston Rockets as an assistant coach, general manager and guiding light for that franchise since 1980.
And the stories flowed.
Rudy Tomjanovich played for the Rockets when Dawson arrived as an assistant coach in 1980 for Harris. Both Tomjanovich and Harris spoke at the service.
“CD loved him some country music,” said Tomjanovich, more of a rock-‘n’-roller who also loved reggae music. “Whoever was driving when we were going to scout teams or players was in charge of the radio.
“CD would tell me who was playing on these country songs – Bobby Joe Dupree with the three-finger banjo. And then he’d say: you like that Spaghetti stuff, right?
“I said: what?
“That Ragu music.”
Harris recalled the Rockets playing a preseason game in Nebraska and remembered afterward going back to the team hotel, which was a Holiday Inn, to sit in the restaurant/bar.
Said the hall of famer: “We’re there and looking around and CD says: you know how to turn a girl from a six into a 10? I thought he was going to say something about having more to drink, but he said: Move her from Houston to Omaha.”
That was about as cutting as any CD-ism would get. He knew how to make people laugh without resorting to insults.
If there was a hall of fame for treating people right, CD would be a charter member. He made everybody feel like his best friend.
Around a table full of NBA executives in the ‘80s, the subject turned to which staff had the biggest partiers. Dawson and Tomjanovich were assistants for Harris.
Harris: “CD said, well, Del and I don’t drink, but I’ll put our staff up against anybody.”
Yes, there was a time when Tomjanovich was legendary.
Dennis Lindsey, formerly on Nico Harrison’s staff with the Mavericks and now with the Detroit Pistons, played at Baylor and was on the staff for Tomjanovich and Dawson in Houston in the ‘90s.
“The Comets of the WNBA were just getting started and CD hired Van Chancellor to coach the team,” Lindsey said. “And they won four championships in a row. But early on, Van came in when CD and I were in the office together and said: I can’t do it. I can’t coach this team.
“It’s like having 12 wives.”
To which Dawson told Lindsey: “Well, at least we don’t have to watch Days of our Lives today. We got Van.”
Yao entertained the gathering of a couple hundred with the story about Dawson telling him he had to come to the locker room to meet with Tomjanovich, who was head coach, and CD, who was general manager.
“When you get called in like that, you know you are in trouble,” the 7-6 Yao said. “When I came into the locker room, the whole team yelled: Happy Chinese New Year. That was the kind of things CD would do.”
Tommy Bowman, the first black scholarship athlete in Baylor history, spoke about the unlikely story of him going from rural Athens, Texas, to Baylor in 1966.
“I went to an all-black school for 11 years. Then, Athens integrated for my last year and I went to Athens High School,” Bowman said. “CD was on his way from Waco to visit his mom in East Texas and stopped at the Texaco in Athens.
“He was getting fuel and the attendant saw the Baylor sticker on the bumper of his car. He asked if CD worked for Baylor. When he found out he was the basketball coach, the attendant said: we got the best high-school player in the state of Texas right here in our town.
“How many times do you think CD had heard that?”
Except this time, it was true. Or at least, Bowman was on the short list of high-school talent in Texas.
“I got home and CD was on the porch, talking to my mama, just because the gas station attendant told him about me,” Bowman said.
And the rest was history as Dawson and Bowman remained friends way past Baylor.
For a few hours, friends and family remember Dawson, who passed away last month. He had relocated to Dallas from the Houston area. The Rockets had a bus bring anybody from the organization that wanted to attend the service.
Baylor coach Scott Drew, hall of famer Calvin Murphy, former Bears coach Jim Haller and many other basketball notables were on hand.
All of it would have probably made CD upset. He didn’t much care for celebrating himself. But that’s OK.
Everybody else took care of that Tuesday.
X: @ESefko
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