The young hoopsters and violent mobsters who first stained basketball with scourge of gambling

Sherman White, 6-foot-8, 210-pound first-team All-American superstar for coach Clair Bee’s renowned LIU powerhouse five, was the nation’s leading scorer in 1951, 77 points shy from becoming the all-time marksman in NCAA history. He could finish, go to the hoop, sky, hit the boards hard. He was the forerunner to Elgin, Connie Hawkins, Dr. J. He led his 28-0 Jersey high school to a state championship and was a poor student with a questionable attitude. 

He was a child, prone to errors in judgment. 

Recently married, White’s future, though, was glowing. He had much to celebrate: Freshly off being named the Sporting News Player of the Year, he was a surefire first-round selection and about to be the third-overall pick in the NBA draft by the New York Knicks. In late February, however, on a cold, windy city night, following the Blackbirds’ 80-53 destruction of a strong Duquesne team in the 49th Street Garden, his life fell apart. 

After the contest, Sherm and his bride stopped at Nedick’s, the hot dog emporium adjacent to the Garden, to grab some franks on toasted buns before heading on the subway back to Brooklyn. His teammates, like White, were all part of a secretive but unified group of point-shaving wayward naive kids who had some concerns. 

They had double-crossed the bad guys, the mob guys, made a decision to win big rather than keep the game close by not turning the ball over, blowing layups, committing stupid fouls, as they had done repeatedly throughout the season. Not coincidentally, a peeved Salvatore Sollazzo bumped into Sherm, who had pocketed at least $10,000 throughout the season. 

Sollazzo, a squat, pock-faced, Genovese crime family associate, had masterminded a nationwide scam, getting seven teams and 35 players to participate in his mission to shave points, award the gambling thieves the all-important edge of insider information, thereby enrich themselves. Sollazzo and his two henchmen were, to put it mildly, upset. He himself lost $30,000, and that did not include his crime syndicate bosses, who he would regularly tip off about all his new ingenious fixes. As he escorted White to his parked limo and ushered him inside, after giving his newlywed a fifty “to buy as many franks as she wanted,” he asked simply, “What the f–k did you do?”