LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Pat Riley hasn't always been one of the biggest winners in NBA history, a guy celebrating his role in 19 NBA Finals and chasing his 10th NBA championship ring when the Miami Heat begin play against the Nuggets on Thursday night in Denver.
In January 1967, Riley was a senior with a sore back on an underachieving University of Kentucky basketball team that missed the NCAA Tournament.
Riley was also Debbie Davis' favorite Wildcat. Considering Kentucky's struggles, Davis expressed words of encouragement to Riley in a letter she addressed to him at Memorial Coliseum in Lexington.
Her father, Harroll, suggested she personalize the letter. Make it read differently from other fan mail and increase the likelihood Riley would answer. Ask him a question. Maybe he will answer it.
So, Debbie Davis, only 15 at the time, did that. She asked Riley what he planned to do after his UK career ended in March of 1967.
It worked. Riley wrote back on Jan. 28, 1967.
He apologized for the Wildcats' inconsistent play, his handwriting and the time that he took to respond.
But for anybody, like me, who wondered how Riley grew into the NBA colossus and Hall of Famer he has become, well, you need to read the third paragraph of Pat Riley's letter to Debbie Davis.
I did.
Davis shared it Thursday afternoon, a day after she heard me repeat the often-told story that Riley only became a coach after he was drafted off the Lakers' broadcasting crew. The team needed an assistant coach to help Paul Westhead, who took over early in the 1980 season after head coach Jack McKinney suffered a serious head injury in a bicycle accident.
Hey, Pat. You're not doing anything important. Do you wanna coach?
The implication has always been that Riley, 78, became an accidental coaching sensation.
There was nothing accidental about Riley's career goals. He confirmed them in the third paragraph of his letter to Davis:
"I guess I will remain in Lexington after I graduate, unless I play pro ball and maybe eventually be a coach," he wrote her.
Yes, coaching was on Riley's career radar.
So was winning. He won his first NBA title as a Lakers' player, his second as an L.A. assistant coach, four more as the Lakers' head coach, another as Miami's coach and two more as the Miami team president. The man has more rings than Tiffany's. Riley has enjoyed more success in the NBA than Anthony Davis, Dan Issel, Cliff Hagan or any other former Wildcat.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, James Worthy, Shaquille O'Neal, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and now Jimmy Butler have all become part of Riley's incredible basketball journey.
Davis has kept the letter in a folder in a safe place for more than a half-century. She'd like to give it to Riley so he can share it with his children as part of his basketball legacy as a coach with the Lakers, Knicks and Heat as well as Miami's top team executive. (I plan to help her connect with Riley after the Heat complete the 2023 NBA Finals against the Nuggets.)
"I've read the letter so many times," Davis said Thursday afternoon. "I've got parts of it memorized."
Davis said that she followed her father's path as a Kentucky basketball fan. Harroll Weedman fought in World War II. He was shot in France and spent time at a prison of war camp in Germany.
A letter from then-Kentucky player Pat Riley to Debbie Davis on Jan. 28, 1967.
But one thing that pulled him through the war experience was the occasional opportunity to listen to Kentucky basketball games on the Armed Forces Radio Network. His love of the Wildcats was passed down to the next generation, as it is in so many families.
Riley arrived at Kentucky in 1963 from Schenectady, New York, where he excelled in football and basketball. He decided to play basketball for Adolph Rupp at Kentucky.
In 1966, Riley was the leading scorer for Rupp's Runts. Until they lost the national final to Texas Western, the first NCAA champion to start five Black players, that top-ranked UK team was acclaimed for winning 27 of its first 28 games without a starting player taller than 6 feet, 5 inches. Riley jumped center — at 6-4.
"He appealed to me because he was always very focused and very serious about his craft," Davis said.
Riley's tenacity and grit helped make him Davis' favorite player, the player she wanted to write after Kentucky started the 1966-67 season with losses to Illinois, Cornell, Vanderbilt and Florida (twice).
She's never forgotten the day that Pat Riley wrote back.
"It was lying on a desk when I walked in from school," David said. "I was so excited it almost took my breath away. I just couldn't believe it. I was speechless. I unfolded it in slow motion before I read it."
On the eve of the NBA Finals, Davis read it one more time Thursday afternoon. The coach in Riley still came through, and it always will.
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