Gola, whose name is not much remembered these days, was a star high school basketball player out of Philadelphia who went on to All-American status at La Salle College. During his years at La Salle, the Explorers won 102 of 121 games, an NIT title in 1952, an NCAA title in 1954, and were NCAA runners-up in 1955. Gola was the undisputed star of those teams. He went on to play in the NBA (a five time all-star), had a brief but successful coaching career, dabbled in Philly politics, and ran an insurance agency and other businesses. He was a man in full.
In a city that produced many great basketball players, Gola is still consider perhaps the best to ever come out of Philadelphia. One of those players once said of him "When I was growing up, you whispered the name Tom Gola. He was like a saint." The Philly-area player who said that was Wilt Chamberlain.
I became aware of the name of Tom Gola when my older brother enrolled in La Salle in 1960. Gola was gone from there by then, but still revered. I remember my brother telling me once of sitting at a desk in a classroom and seeing "Tom Gola sat here" carved into a desk. I can also remember saving my money when I was around 12 or 13 and finally scrapping up four bucks or so to buy a basketball and being very excited to see that it was a "Tom Gola" model ball.
When La Salle made a run into the NCAA Sweet 16 last spring, a nice by-product of that was to see that Gola's name and accomplishments were publicized once again.
RIP Tom Gola.
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