Will Robinson

While sitting in his office at The Palace, Will Robinson thumbs through a scrapbook chock full of memorabilia that documents his long and illustrious career as an athlete, coach, and educator.

The office walls are covered with pictures of the successful Piston teams that Robinson has helped to develop over the past 16 years. His accomplishments with the Pistons alone would be enough to satisfy most people.

Ah, but Robinson isn�t like most people. As he looks through the scrapbook, Robinson�s eyes light up. Each memento has a story, each face in every picture has a name and Robinson remembers them all.

Memories? Robinson has a million of them.

Robinson grew up in Steubenville, Ohio. While in high school, he played on the football, basketball, baseball, track and golf teams. In fact, Robinson is the only student in Steubenville High School history to letter in five sports in a single season.

But in the 1930s, being a black athlete wasn�t without its problems.

�My coach caught hell for naming me quarterback,� Robinson said, while looking at a picture of his high school football team. �Until we started winning, that is.� And win they did. As the team�s captain, Robinson led his team through an undefeated, unscored upon season.

Robinson was also the captain of the school�s golf team� he learned to play golf by working as a caddie at a nearby country club�and during his senior year he led his team to the Ohio state championships in Columbus.

While in Columbus, Robinson wasn�t allowed to room or eat with his white teammates,

�Prejudice was the thing of the day,� he said. �I couldn�t stay in hotels or eat in public places. As the only black member of the team I didn�t have access to that. I stayed at the black YMCA and ate in the club kitchen. I also wasn�t allowed to have a caddie.�

Despite this adversity, he still shot a one over-par 73 and finished second in the tournament.

Robinson�s athletic ability attracted a lot of attention and after he completed high school he attended West Virginia State College on a work scholarship.

After graduation he wasn�t able to find a job so he decided to pursue a master�s degree in physical education.

Due to segregation in West Virginia colleges, it was impossible for Robinson to attend graduate school in the mountaineer state. But there was a catch: if a college refused to admit students because of their race, they were obligated to pay the student�s tuition at a school that would admit them. In Robinson�s case, the school that accepted him was the University of Michigan.

After receiving his master�s degree from U of M, Robinson was still unable to find work. So he returned to Steubenville where he played for three area semi-pro basketball teams. Simultaneously!

Robinson finally found a coaching job at the YMCA in Pittsburgh, PA and from there he moved into the YMCA system in Chicago. In the 1940s, the YMCA system was a very popular athletic venue. In Pittsburgh and Chicago, Robinson led very successful teams, frequently guiding basketball and swimming teams from both cities to national championship tournaments. As a result of the notoriety he received in the Chicago YMCA system, Robinson was hired to coach at Du Sable High School in Chicago.

After only six months at Du Sable, Robinson was transferred to Miller High School in Detroit.

�I didn�t want to come to Detroit,� Robinson said. �I was happy in Chicago, and when I came and visited (Detroit) the school gym was as big as this room, no pool, no field, it had nothing at all.�

At a national conference of public school superintendents, one topic of discussion was how to cool an explosive situation in Detroit as a result of the city�s race riots in 1943. Robinson�s name kept coming up as the right man to diffuse the situation. As a result, Robinson was given an ultimatum: take the job in Detroit or the superintendent of Chicago public schools would personally see to it that he wouldn�t advance any further in the Chicago school system. Robinson took the job.

For 16 years Robinson was the only black high school coach in Michigan and he continued his tradition of focusing on education as well as athletic excellence. Charlie Primas, a former student of Robinson�s at Miller and currently the president of the school�s alumni association, said, �He used to recite poetry to us. He would say things in his own jargon and if you thought about it you could gain a broad perspective (on life).�

It wasn�t unusual for Robinson to make the extra effort for his kids. At Miller, many of his players were from lower income families, and to help them out, he made arrangements with the local postmaster for his basketball team to work at the post office during Christmas break. This way, Robinson said, they would keep out of trouble and earn extra money to make their holidays a little nicer.

As demanding as he was on his teams, Robinson was equally dedicated to them. �If you stay with me,� he told his players, �I�ll see that you will get a chance to go to college.� And he was true to his word. He is responsible for sending over 300 of his students to college, 25 of which now hold doctoral degrees.

Of course not all of Robinson�s players opted for college. Instead, Robinson suggested they consider a career in the military. And 25 former athletes, on Robinson�s recommendation, went on to work in law enforcement as police officers.

You see, Robinson recognized that many of the opportunities that he had received were a direct result of his hard work and initiative. This is something he wanted to instill into his students. One way in which Robinson created an opportunity for himself was by initiating a coaching clinic for minority coaches. While coaching in Detroit, Robinson recognized that the coaches at southern black schools, due to a lack of coaching experience, were inferior to their white counterparts. To improve their skills, Robinson sponsored an annual coaching clinic. He recruited coaches from the Detroit Tigers and Lions to cover baseball and football and he conducted the basketball clinic.

After participating in several of these clinics, Lions� head coach, Buddy Parker, recognized Robinson�s sports knowledge and experience with southern black athletes.

To take advantage of this untapped pool of athletic talent, Parker hired Robinson as the first black scout in the NFL.

Charlie Sanders and Lem Barney (Robinson said when Barney arrived in Detroit, he didn�t have a suit so he took him to get one) are just two of the names, that Robinson brought to the Lions.

In 1967, Illinois State University Athletic Director Dr. Milt Weisbecher went out on a limb and hired Robinson as the first black head basketball coach in NCAA Division-1 history.

Even though Weisbecher took the initiative to hire him, he left the ball in Robinson�s court. Robinson said that he had to coordinate the entire basketball program, which included scheduling the teams� games. This wasn�t as easy as one might think. Not many schools were eager to play�and maybe lose to�a school with a black head coach. Schools would make up excuses not to play Illinois State; some schools went as far as to accuse them of cheating.

Despite five consecutive winning seasons, Robinson wasn�t happy in Normal, Ill. so he returned to his home of 28 years, Detroit.

While at ISU, Robinson was able to convey the same type of positive message he had been successful with on the high school level to his college athletes. After practice Robinson would pull a newspaper out and discuss current events with his players. This was to emphasize that there was more to life than just sports.

Doug Collins, an All-American guard, played for Robinson at ISU.

�The first time I met Coach Robinson I liked him,� Collins said. �I liked what he had to say about my future.�

And what a future Collins had in store as he went on to play in the NBA and coach the Chicago Bulls. �I�ll always appreciate what he did for me.�

�I�ve been able to help other people improve their lot in life,� Robinson said.

University of Southern California head basketball coach, George Raveling can attest to that. Raveling was an assistant coach at Villanova while Robinson was at Illinois State. When Raveling was offered the head coaching job at Washington State University he sought Robinson�s advice before he made his decision. The problem with the Washington State job, Robinson said, was they were offering Raveling less money than he was making as a Villanova assistant.

�I told him that if he could coach,� Robinson recalled, �then the money would come later.� And he was right. After coaching at Washington State, Raveling moved on to more lucrative and higher profile coaching positions at Iowa and USC.

The success stories that Robinson has had a hand in are countless.

There�s the one about the kid who dropped out of school and got a job because his mother had cancer. He didn�t tell anybody because he didn�t want to burden the team with his problems. Robinson tracked him down at the bus station where he was working as a porter, convinced the kid to come back to school, got him an after-school job and helped his family with money out of his own pocket. The kid went on to play football for and graduate from Michigan State.

Then there�s one about Lawrence Patrick who played for Robinson at Cass Tech. He�s the kid who went on to become an attorney and is now the president of the Detroit School Board.

�He taught us a lot,� Patrick said. �(He taught us) to be prepared and to accept responsibility for our actions.�

Since coming to the Pistons organization in 1975, Robinson has continued to work his magic with people.

�He�s a great judge of character,� Pistons� scout and Robinson�s partner in crime, Stan Novak said. �He has the ability, with that happy smile of his, to get along with everybody.�

�Personally he�s been a father figure,� Isiah Thomas said. �He�s been inspirational and the most HONEST person I�ve met on a professional level.�

In the more than 50 years that he has been involved with kids in sports and education, Robinson sees his influence on these people as a natural occurrence.

�I used sports as my denominator for kids to grow,� he said. �Sports wasn�t the most important thing in life. It�s only the beginning�not the end of the world.

�I grew up in very difficult times. I observed and learned. Nobody was preparing me, I was preparing myself. I was trying to get the most out of life.�

After 28 years with the Pistons, Will Robinson finally retired in 2003. During his time with the club, he discovered players such as John Salley, Dennis Rodman and Joe Dumars. Robinson is widely credited with being a major part of the formulation of the Bad Boys championship teams of 1989 and 1990. Robinson has been widely recognized for his contribution to athletics. His 1982 induction into the Michigan Hall of Fame marked his seventh such honor. The others include: The Michigan Coaches Hall of Fame, The West Virginia State Hall of Fame, The Illinois State Hall of Fame, The Upper Ohio Valley Dapper Dan Hall of Fame, The Afro-American Sports Hall of Fame, and The Michigan High School Basketball Hall of Fame.

Though he was not inducted, two more hall presented Robinson with prestigious awards. In 1992, Robinson was honored by the James Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, MA, receiving the John W. Bunn Award in recognition outstanding contributions to the game of basketball. Outside of enshrinement, the Bunn Award is the most prestigious award given by the Hall of Fame. Others who have won the Bunn Award include John Wooden, Henry Iba, Red Auerbach, and Bob Cousy. During the summer of 1995, Robinson was also honored by the Michigan Jewish Sports Hall of Fame with the Alvin N. Foon Award for his great contribution to Michigan sports.

All told Robinson has dedicated 65 years to the evolution of young people in sports, 45 of those years on the bench as a coach. It�s not the names or the championship that give Robinson the most pride. Instead, it is the more than 300 athletes he has assisted in obtaining college athletic scholarships.