Hank Gathers

Gathers was born to Lucille and Eric Gathers Sr. in Philadelphia. located in North Philadelphia. ==College career==

USC Gathers and Kimble were not friends until their senior year at Dobbins. Both of them were recruited to the University of Southern California (USC) by head coach Stan Morrison and his top assistant David Spencer. During a visit to USC, the two recruits were told that the area around campus was deemed a slum. Gathers and Kimble, however, considered the area to be a suburb compared to their home of Philadelphia. They were joined on the Trojans by high school All-American, Tom Lewis, and Rich Grande as the "Four Freshmen" star recruiting class. Following an 11–17 season in 1985–86, Morrison and Spencer were fired despite having won the Pac-10 Conference the previous year. It was reported that the players would not remain unless certain conditions were met, including having a say in the next coaching staff. Raveling gave the players a deadline to respond whether they would remain on the team. When they did not respond, he revoked the scholarships of Gathers, Kimble, and Lewis. Raveling's controversial statement was, "You can't let the Indians run the reservation," he said. "You've got to be strong, too. Sometimes you have to tell them that they have to exit." Loyola Marymount Due to NCAA regulations, Gathers and Kimble could not play in the season following their transfer. They helped lead the Lions to a 28–4 record in 1987–88. Gathers led the team that year in both scoring and rebounding (averaging 22.5 points and 8.7 rebounds per game), was named first-team All-WCC and was awarded the WCC tournament MVP. In the 1988–89 season, Gathers became the second player in NCAA Division I history to lead the nation in scoring and rebounding in the same season, averaging 32.7 points and 13.7 rebounds per game. He was named WCC Player of the Year and again won the WCC Tournament MVP. After the season, he decided against declaring for the NBA draft. LMU's 122.4 point per game in 1990 is still a record as of April 2012. As of April 2012, Loyola Marymount held the five highest combined score games in Division I history. Four of the five occurred during Gathers' career, including a record 331 in the 181–150 win over United States International University on January 31, 1989. At and , Gathers was Loyola Marymount's strongest inside player. He had a high field goal percentage because he seldom shot from beyond . He used his power and quickness for follow-up baskets and scoring on fast breaks. "I don't care much about the points," said Gathers. "In fact, I should lead the nation in scoring because of my rebounding. Anybody can score 30 points a night if that's what he's concentrating on. But rebounding is special because it comes from the heart." ==Heart condition and death==

On December 9, 1989, Gathers collapsed at an LMU home game against UC Santa Barbara. He was found to have an abnormal heartbeat (exercise-induced ventricular tachycardia), and was prescribed a beta blocker, Inderal. Originally prescribed at 240 milligrams per day, his Inderal dosage was cut to 40 mg per day over the next three months. Gathers returned after sitting out for three weeks and missing two games, However, he struggled with his play for weeks after returning. The Lions won seven of their next eight games, On Sunday, March 4, Gathers collapsed again with 13:34 left in the first half of the semifinal game against the Portland Pilots. He had just scored a dunk on an alley-oop pass from point guard Terrell Lowery that put the Lions up 25–13. He attempted to get up, telling the athletic trainers, "I don't want to lay down!" Shortly after, he stopped breathing. Gathers was pronounced dead at nearby Marina Del Rey Hospital at 6:55 PM PST. He was 23 years old. ESPN showed graphic footage of Gathers' collapse on SportsCenter; the network was at the game recording advance footage for the championship game it was scheduled to televise the next night. Late that night, the WCC canceled the tournament and awarded Loyola the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament due to its WCC regular season title. Gathers was buried at the Mount Lawn Cemetery in Sharon Hill, Pennsylvania. Loyola Marymount settled out of court for $1.4 million, while the cardiologist who treated Gathers settled for $1 million. ==Legacy==

Loyola Marymount was placed in the West Regional as the No. 11 seed in that season's NCAA tournament. Before the tournament, the right-handed Kimble vowed to shoot his first free throw of each game left-handed, in memory of Gathers. Though naturally right-handed, Gathers was a poor free-throw shooter and had switched to shooting them left-handed. The Lions advanced to the Elite Eight, including a victory over defending national champion Michigan, before falling to the eventual champions, UNLV. Gathers was named a consensus second-team All-America and first team All-WCC selection for the season. He finished his career averaging 28.0 points and making 59 percent of his field goals, which were both school records as of 2010. He also averaged 11.1 rebounds for his career. He was voted WCC Player of the Decade for the 1980s. Gersten Pavilion, LMU's on-campus athletics facility, is known to Lions fans as "Hank's House", although that is not part of its official name. His No. 44 and Kimble's No. 30 were retired by LMU in a joint ceremony in 2000. In 2005, the entire 1989–90 team was inducted into Loyola Marymount's Hall of Fame. On February 29, 2020, four days before the 30th anniversary of his death, a statue of Gathers was unveiled outside Gersten Pavilion. The statue was created by Rotblatt-Amrany, which designed multiple statues outside of the Staples Center in Los Angeles, as well as the Michael Jordan statue in Chicago. Gathers' life was dramatized in a 1992 TV movie, Final Shot: The Hank Gathers Story, with Victor Love starring as Gathers. Gathers was part of the storyline in the ESPN film Guru of Go about Westhead, part of their 30 for 30 series. Gathers' death reemerged in national news wires during the 2016 NBA Playoffs when Kimble, interviewed for the celebrity gossip website TMZ.com, urged that Miami Heat star Chris Bosh retire for health reasons. Bosh has been suffering from blood clotting issues that forced him to miss the last several months of both the 2014–15 and 2015–16 seasons, as well as the entirety of the 2016–17 season. While Bosh felt that he was healthy enough to continue playing, Kimble disagreed:There are so many other things he could do with his life. Hank Gathers had the same thing, Hank could have been a comedian, an actor or did speaking engagements. It's not worth the risk. I would just say absolutely not, don't do it. If Hank had the ability to do it again he wouldn't have paid the ultimate price ... I am sure [Bosh] has children and they are going to need their father around as much as possible. ==Career statistics==

Awards • 1989 WCC Player of the Year • 2× WCC Tournament MVP (1988, 1989) • Consensus second-team All-American (1990) • 3× First-team All-WCC (1988, 1989, 1990) • 2× All-WCC Tournament (1988, 1989) Records WCC • Career points (2,490) • Field goals made, career (1,037) • Field goals made, season (419) • Free throws attempted, career (745) • Free throws attempted, season (315) LMU • Career scoring average (28.0) • Field goals made, game (24) • Field goals attempted, game (37) • Field goal percentage, career (.590) • Rebounds, game (29) Achievements • 1989 NCAA Division I scoring leader • 1989 NCAA Division I rebounding leader ==Personal life==

Gathers was 16 when his son, Aaron Crump, was born. He gained control of the money when he turned 18. It became a problem for Crump, who later described himself as a "young black male with no guidance" at that time. He pleaded guilty to aggravated assault with a weapon, and was in a state prison from 2007 until 2012. By the time he was released, the settlement money he received from Gathers' death had been squandered. Gathers' nephew, D.J. Rivera, played college basketball at St. Joesph's University before transferring to Binghamton University and leading the America East Conference in scoring with the Binghamton Bearcats in the 2008–09 season, in which they won the conference for the first time and earned their first bid to the NCAA tournament, where Rivera scored 20 points in a first-round loss against Duke. He later transferred to the University of Montevallo, losing in the Division II championship game in 2012. ==See also==