Sad news from the NBA arrived on Wednesday night as it was learned that former Seattle SuperSonics star Gus Williams passed away.
Williams, nicknamed “The Wizard”, became a legend in Seattle after helping lead the team to its sole NBA Championship in 1979.
Williams was selected by the Golden State Warriors in the second round of the 1975 NBA Draft out of USC. He spent two years with the team and finished second in Rookie of the Year voting. He then signed with Seattle as a free agent but didn’t make much of an immediate impact.
But once Lenny Wilkins became head coach and put Williams into the starting lineup alongside Dennis Johnson, his career took off.
He averaged 18.1 ppg that year and helped lead the team to the Finals where they lost to the Washington Bullets in seven games. In year two, he pushed his average to 19.2 ppg in the regular season and then exploded in the playoffs, averaging 26.7 ppg en route to Seattle’s first and only NBA title.
After his third season in 1979-80 where he made second-team All-NBA, Williams held out and missed the entire 1980-81 season due to a contract dispute. The team crumbled without him, going from 56 wins the prior year to only 34.
He returned the following year with a vengeance averaging a career-high 23.4 ppg and 6.9 apg (he would best the latter by averaging 8.0 apg and 8.4 apg in 1982-83 and 1983-84, respectively). That year he was named first-team All-NBA, named Comeback Player of the Year and made the first of his two All-Star teams (1982-83 was the second).
After the 83-84 season, Williams was traded to the Bullets as the team wanted to build around center Jack Sikma. He played for the Bullets for two seasons before playing his last year in the NBA with the Atlanta Hawks in 1986-87.
In 2020, Williams suffered a stroke and was residing in Baltimore, where he passed away on Wednesday night at the age of 71.
GIP Gus Williams.
