By Antonis Stroggylakis/ @AStroggylakis
It’s a bit rare for a player with zero history in the NBA to be chosen for the ultimate honor of being inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
While Nick Galis was widely considered NBA caliber player, including opinions by prestigious luminaries of the sport (Red Auerbach had once said that the biggest mistake of his career was not signing Galis to the Boston Celtics back in the day), he never actually got to play in the best league of the planet, spending the entirety of his professional career in Greece, with the jerseys of Aris Thessaloniki (mainly) and Panathinaikos.
His greatest accomplishments arrived with the Greek national team which he led to the Eurobasket 1987 title (the first trophy won by Greece in an international team competition) as tournament top scorer and MVP and to the silver medal in Eurobasket 1989 where he also dropped more points than any other player.
Given the fact that Greece is a small country that lacked any serious hoop tradition before the above achievements, these feats were nothing short of wondrous. More importantly, they ushered an age of Renaissance in Greek basketball that absolutely catapulted the level of the sport in the country and began a circle of international successes for clubs that are now considered European powerhouses.
This is perhaps Galis’ greatest badge, most important contribution, and valuable inheritance. The way he totally transformed how basketball is perceived by a whole country almost single handedly and the beneficial domino effect his presence brought. Not only towards numerous European titles by Greek clubs that have been protagonists at a continental level for the past 25 years but to the production of players that are even… NBA All-Stars.
To put it simply, Galis put Greek basketball on the map.
The tweet announcing his induction into the HOF characterized him as the “greatest player in Greek history known for his great scoring ability”. Indeed Galis led all players in points during every single international competition he participated from 1983 to 1991. HOF couldn’t overlook that for long. It’s special.
Only five players before Galis were elected to the HOF without ever registering their names for an NBA game. Prior to Galis, the most recent addition was Brazilian mega-scorer Oscar Schmidt, one of the most notoriously prolific bucket-makers in the history of the sport. The list is as follows:
| Year | Name |
| 2013 | Oscar Schmidt (Brazil) |
| 2004 | Drazen Dalipagic (Bosnia) |
| 2003 | Dino Meneghin (Italy) |
| 1996 | Kresimir Cosic (Croatia) |
| 1992 | Sergei Belov (Russia) |
The list of European former NBA-ers chosen for the HOF includes Lithuanians Arvydas Sabonis and Sarunas Marculionis plus the one and only Drazen Petrovic, whose life came to a tragic end after a car crash at age 28.
| Year | Name |
| 2014 | Sarunas Marciulionis (Lithuania) |
| 2011 | Arvydas Sabonis (Lithuania) |
| 2002 | Drazen Petrovic (Croatia) |