Ward Lambert

Vocation

Notable

American basketball and baseball coach, nicknamed "Piggy," who wrote Practical Basketball in 1932, one of the first "bibles" of the game. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1960 and the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006. He served as the head basketball coach at Purdue University during the 1916–1917 season and from 1918 to 1946. Lambert was also the head baseball coach at Purdue in 1917, from 1919 to 1935, and from 1945 to 1946. Following his retirement from Purdue, he served as Commissioner of the National Basketball League during the final three years (1946–1949) of that league's tenure and was instrumental in its merger with the Basketball Association of America to form the National Basketball Association. Lambert Field, Purdue's former baseball stadium, is named for Lambert. He was listed as a scout for the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball in 1948. Lambert coached and mentored several future NCAA coaches; the most notable include John Wooden, Mel Taube, Blair Gullion, Emmett Lowery, Donald White, Jim Hinga and Ray Eddy. Ward "Piggy" Lambert died on 20 January 1958, aged 69, in Lafayette, Indiana. Link to Wikipedia biography