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peter vecsey

Peter Vecsey

Peter Vecsey has been the Post’s NBA columnist since 1976. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2009. Also in the New York City Basketball Hall of Fame, at Holcombe Rucker he coached two championships in the early ’70s (Julius Erving, Charlie Scott, Billy Paultz, Joe DePre, Ollie Taylor) and two more in the early ’80s (Louis Orr, Sam Worthen). A graduate of Archbishop Molloy High School, Peter spent two years in the Army (1965-67) as a member of the Airborne and Special Forces.

Latest Columns

  • Remembering gentleman Knick who balled at Rucker

    The last time Pat Cummings and I were together, the mood was tense, the bitterness intense from years of rubbing each other raw with words that hurt and branding him with a derogatory nickname that stuck. By...   July 01, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Deron will be back with Nets, especially if Dwight joins

    Soon after Bruce Ratner bought the Nets and revealed intentions to relocate from New Jersey to Brooklyn, he asked whether I’d attend more or fewer home games. It’d be impossible to show up less than zero. Not that it...   June 28, 2012

    From Nets
  • Walsh’s return to Pacers imminent; Bird to stay on as consultant

    Donnie Walsh and I have been playing a little game for almost three decades. This is how it works: I call and leave a message, asking for verification on this, that or the third thing. No response means he can’t tell me...   June 26, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Swapping crowns leads King James to the throne

    So, as I’m waiting to flotilla out of Florida, I felt compelled to support the newspaper industry by purchasing some of the local periodicals to get their take on what I had just seen.  Not surprisingly, I guess, nearly...   June 24, 2012

    From Nets
  • Coaching hire a risky one for Jordan

    MIAMI — As usual, Charlotte owner Michael Jordan caught those shadowing him off balance. After Bobcats president Rod Higgins made it Bahamas’-water clear management was in the hunt for a coach with NBA head coaching...   June 22, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Relax OKC; all the pressure is on Heat

    MIAMI — So, 30 of 30 second-place finishers in NBA Finals history that were entrenched in the excavation site the Thunder are now wedged failed to claw their way out. So, I guess that means the odds are marginally...   June 21, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Thunder coach Brooks must keep Durant off James

    MIAMI — The Thunder have discovered what the Heat already knew and continue to demonstrate despite the Heat’s 2-1 series status: The first three rounds of playoff pressure is nothin’ compared to the stress and strain of...   June 19, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Brooks needs to cut powerless Perkins’ time

    MIAMI — Welcome to a place made famous by Jackie Gleason, Don Johnson and the Floridians.  We are gathered here for the annual rite of the passage known as the Middle 3, as in Games 3, 4 and 5 of the David Derby. Jim...   June 17, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Dream Team not worth glorifying

    IRONIC how yesterday was Flag Day and here we are, draped in drool over the 20th anniversary of the narcissistic 1992 Dream Team. Like long time reader Lawrence Bentley of Plano, Texas, I am proud to say I have never...   June 15, 2012

    From Nets
  • Blood & Thunder

    I thought those damn Celtics would never go away At last we get to see what the vast majority of unaffiliated fans longed to see once this season was unlocked: The NBA’s most infamous association against its most...   June 12, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Ellis illness makes joining ’72 Lakers bittersweet experience

    On April 5, privileged life that I lead, at the invitation of Bill and Joyce Sharman, I attended the 40th reunion of the Lakers’ 1972 championship team, which practically paled compared to the 33 games in a row they won...   June 10, 2012

    From More Sports
  • LeBron's death-defying feat

    NOT that I’ve seen LeBron play all that often, you understand, but from the outset of last night’s leisurely Boston Harbor cruise, he appeared more unemotionally transfixed than ever before, a motion later seconded by...   June 08, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Spurs coach tinkered with winning formula

    In case you’re wondering throughout the read, this is no Pop Smear.  Wunderkind that Gregg Popovich is, he was first to decipher the scrawl on the cave wall.  It took the rest of us geniuses two imposing victories to...   June 08, 2012

    From More Sports
  • NBA stars getting no love from whistle-happy refs

    David Stern hasn’t been able to control his giddiness since the NBA’s conference finals were shrunk to two mini-series.  So what if home cooking had held serve through Sunday, albeit barely! Especially seeing that...   June 05, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Durant a great guy on, off court

    Kevin Durant cannot possibly, as commonly portrayed, be as great a guy as he is a player, right?  “He’s actually better!” Matt Tumbleson countered when posed the impious question while the Thunder’s director of...   June 03, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Spurs wise not to trade Parker, Ginobili

    Last season at this time, the Spurs, who had finished at the top of the NBA’s Western Conference, already had been eliminated two rounds previously by the eighth-place Grizzlies.  The Celtics, meanwhile, had been erased...   June 01, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Spurs may not steal all of the Thunder in this series

    Some perspective and pragmatism might hit the spot following the Spurs’ methodical seminar against the Western Conference’s newest class of dilated pupils, who acted more like the Dunder, Blunder and Asunder than the...   May 29, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Can’t wait for shootout at Alamo & OKCorral

    It doesn’t get more captivating than the invincible Spurs against the near-impregnable Thunder.  Had the Spice Bosh-less Heat not vividly reversed their 1-2 fade against the Pacers, the winner of this Sumo Series would...   May 27, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Celtics-Sixers anybody’s series to win

    With the desire to become farcically repetitive, do not expect Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish to walk into TD Garden tomorrow night for Game 7.  No sweat!  The Ancient Men of the C's should have little...   May 25, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Magic need miracle man after axing Van Gundy, Smith

    OK, now what? In a move that caught just Jeff Van Gundy unsuspecting, Magic coach Stan Van Gundy and general manager Otis Smith became unrestricted free agents yesterday, having been sent to the canning factory for jobs...   May 22, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Lakers, Clippers deliver double dud out west

    LOST ANGELES — Traffic on the 110 was at a standstill most of yesterday afternoon and into the late evening as a result of two horrific crashes inside Staples Center.  The first mishap occurred when the Clippers...   May 20, 2012

    From Knicks
  • OKC must find way to keep Harden

    Spoke to a coach and “Scout” — collective time around the NBA 90 years or so — the other night about James Harden, the Thunder’s smartest player, by far, and every bit as important to the team’s success as Kevin Durant...   May 18, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Fiery Paul draws extra fuel from UNC snub

    I love Chris Paul’s posture. I remind me of him. He doesn’t take even the slightest slights stoically. He gets both angry and even. Either on the spot or with the first chance that presents itself.  I second that...   May 15, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Nuggets’ brassy brass made out like bandits

    If Nuggets president Josh Kroenke and general manager Masai Ujiri have made an important personnel mistake in the two years since their minds meshed as Babes in David Stern’s Toyland, feel free to alert me to it....   May 13, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Don’t count on Knicks improvement

    The Knicks are now 1-8 as playoff pushovers since the acquisition of Carmelo Anthony was proclaimed the best trade in franchise history by several skewed media masterminds, who apparently never heard of Dave DeBusschere...   May 11, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Heat sweep would do no favors for Woodson

    Tennyson, anyone? With apologies to Alfred Lord, “’Tis better to have made the playoffs and lost every game than to never have made the scene.”  That reworded quote figures to serve as the spin-dry James Dolan’s drones...   May 06, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Knicks’ losing, Melo’s role extinguish Stoudemire’s joy

    In case of ire, break glass. Summing up L’affaire Apostroph’e, suffice to say Amar’e Stoudemire was feeling fairly discouraged when he debilitated himself by going weak-minded to the window pane. And, should the Knicks...   May 04, 2012

    From Knicks
  • Rondo-bout isn’t fair play

    Play along (sing, if you like) with me for minute.  Rajon Rondo’s ejection from Game 1 of the Celtics-Hawks series for taking in vain the name of Marc Davis and consequent one-game suspension for Game 2 for doin’ the...   May 01, 2012

    From Knicks
  • The Post’s Peter Vecsey forecasts first round of NBA Playoffs

    There’s nothing like repeatedly seeing the Eastern Conference’s seventh-best team on national TV in the so-called game of the week(end). The Knicks have been showcased five times on Sunday — topping Cardinal Dolan —...   April 28, 2012

    From More Sports
  • Former owner Taub sorry to see Nets go

    Jersey Joe Taub (Walcott will have to stand down) and his brother, Henry, whose brainstorm Automatic Data Processing, at 21, rocket-boosted their family from privation to privileged, returned the Nets’ franchise to the...   April 24, 2012

    From Nets

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