CLEVELAND — The first head coach in the history of the Cleveland Cavaliers is about to receive basketball's highest honor.
According to Fox 26 Houston sports director Mark Berman, Bill Fitch is among those elected to this year's class of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
Fitch's coaching career spanned more than four decades, beginning as an assistant at Creighton in 1956 and ending as the head coach of the Los Angeles Clippers in 1998.
His impressive resume is highlighted by leading the Boston Celtics to the 1981 NBA Championship over the Houston Rockets. Five years later, he was on the opposite sideline as head coach of the Rockets as they fell to Boston in the NBA Finals.
The 86-year-old Fitch will always be beloved in Cleveland as the first head coach of the Cavaliers. He came aboard the expansion franchise in 1970 thanks in large part to his friendship with owner Nick Mileti.
"When I was coaching Bowling Green, Nick Mileti came along and got [BGSU athletic director] Doyt Perry and I in a room," Fitch recalled in an interview with Ohio Magazine in 2015. "Nick was an alumnus, and he wanted to get college basketball at Cleveland Arena. We were friends from then on."
It was not easy at the beginning.
"We were starting from scratch, and I mean literally from scratch. It was Nick, his lawyer and a guy named Bob Brown, who did everything from publicity to you name it. He even called the first couple games. And it was my job to get the secretaries and the trainers and the assistants and put the program together," Fitch told Ohio Magazine's Vince Guerrieri.
The Cavs were just 15-67 that first year. But things would get better.
In 1975-76, the Cavaliers engineered one of the most exciting playoff runs in Cleveland sports history. It was known as "The Miracle of Richfield."
The team captured the Central Division title, knocked off the Washington Bullets in seven games to advance to the Eastern Conference Finals. Prior to the start of the series with Boston, center Jim Chones broke his foot. The shorthanded Cavs lost to the Celtics in six games. Fitch would win the first of his two NBA Coach of the Year awards that year.
Fitch stayed in Cleveland until 1979, then made NBA coaching stops in Boston, Houston, New Jersey, and the L.A. Clippers. He coached in 2,050 professional games, winning 944 and losing 1,106.
Prior to his start in Cleveland, Fitch had a successful run as a collegiate basketball head coach. He began at his alma mater, Coe College, in 1958, before moving to North Dakota in 1962. Fitch's Fighting Hawks squads advanced to three NCAA Division II tournament appearances during his tenure.
In 1967, Fitch arrived in Ohio to take over as head coach of Bowling Green State University. In his only season, he led the Falcons to the Mid-American Conference championship and a berth in the NCAA tournament. BG has not been back to the tournament since. Fitch would move on to coach at the University of Minnesota for two seasons before getting the call from Miletti to take the helm of the expansion Cavaliers.
The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Class of 2019 will be officially announced prior to the Final Four on Saturday in Minneapolis.
