Jo Jo White obit

Jo Jo White, former Celtics All-Star, dies at 71

He was not on the list.

With 36 seconds left in the third overtime on June 4, 1976, Jo Jo White sat down in Boston Garden near midcourt – arms outstretched behind him, chest heaving. He paused to rest as his Celtics teammate Glenn McDonald prepared to take, and make, two foul shots that would be Boston’s last points in a 128-126 victory that put the team up 3-2 in the NBA finals.

No one could begrudge Mr. White for being exhausted in Game 5’s waning moments. In what many consider the most remarkable NBA finals game ever played, he was on the court for 60 of 63 minutes and scored a game-high 33 points, including 15 in the three overtime periods.

It was only fitting that a half-minute after he rose from the Garden’s parquet floor, Mr. White dribbled the ball for the game’s final seconds, beyond the reach of the Phoenix Suns. Then he heaved a hook shot into the crowd past the basket after the final buzzer marked Boston’s win.

Mr. White, the most valuable player when Boston won that 1976 championship series and a Hall of Fame point guard who spent nearly a decade with the Celtics, was 71 when he died Tuesday. His daughter Meka White Morris told theundefeated.com that he died of pneumonia, a complication from dementia that resulted from surgery several years ago to remove a brain tumor.

Consistency defined Mr. White’s Boston years, as did his difficult-to-defend jump shot. He set a franchise record by playing in 488 consecutive games, including every single one in the seasons from 1972-73 through 1976-77.

Mr. White averaged 18.3 points per game for the Celtics, according to an NBA website, and was even better in the clutch, averaging 21.5 points in career playoff games.

“He’s almost like a wallflower,” Celtics coach Tom Heinsohn told the Globe in 1974. “But he gets his 20 points and seven or eight assists, and people say, ‘When did he do that?’ ”

The Celtics retired Mr. White’s No. 10 jersey in 1982, and he was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015.

A key Celtics player during the years between Bill Russell era and the arrival of Larry Bird, Mr. White was a seven-time All-Star as he played on Boston’s 1974 and ’76 championship teams.

“We are terribly saddened by the passing of the great Jo Jo White,” the Celtics said in a statement. “He was a champion and a gentleman; supremely talented and brilliant on the court, and endlessly gracious off of it.”

The Celtics added that Mr. White’s “contributions to the team’s championship legacy may have only been surpassed by the deep and lasting impact that he had in the community. The thoughts and sympathies of the entire Celtics organization are with the White family.”

In an online chat posted on the Celtics’ website, Mr. White said Game 5 of the 1976 finals “is frozen in time,” and added: “I vividly remember just about every play made during that game.”

In many ways, that performance encapsulated his career in a single game as Boston won its 13th NBA title and he collected his second championship ring. His court presence was understated, his face often expressionless.

“I play hard within my style,” he once told the Globe. No one could remember him dunking in a game, mostly because he never had to.

“Always a soothing player to the spirit, White in his prime was like a smooth, high-priced Scotch,” the Globe’s Bob Ryan wrote in 1979.

Born in St. Louis, Joseph Henry White was the youngest of seven children. His father, the Rev. George White, was a Baptist minister. His mother was the former Elizabeth Guynn.

“You’ve heard of second-hand? I got seventh-hand,” Mr. White said with a laugh in a 1974 Globe interview.

As a boy he played football until a hand injury prompted his mother to ask him to try a different sport. He began obsessively playing basketball in a St. Louis recreation center, sometimes shooting hoops until midnight. At McKinley High School, he became an all-state player and was recruited to play at the University of Kansas. He also had been a star wide receiver on the football team.

“Gale is the one who recruited me to college,” he once told the Globe, referring to Gale Sayers, a Hall of Fame running back for the Chicago Bears who had played for Kansas.

Indeed, the Dallas Cowboys also drafted Mr. White, who liked to note that he was a rarity – drafted by NBA, NFL, and Major League Baseball teams, and by the military. His future was never really in doubt, however. He turned down the Cincinnati Reds, and during a meeting in Dallas, “it all ended when the Cowboys asked me which sport I preferred . . . and I told them basketball,” Mr. White recalled in 1995, adding, “I feel I made a pretty good decision.”

He spent four years as a point guard at Kansas, where he was an All-American and also was a starter for the 1967 World University Games, the 1967 Pan American Games, and the gold medal-winning US team in the 1968 Olympics. He averaged 15.3 points per game for a Kansas team that rarely scored 80 points and was just as well-known for his ball-handling and defense.

During the NBA draft in 1969, the year he graduated, Celtics general manager Red Auerbach waited as the eight teams ahead of Boston in the first round picked other players. Mr. White was still available when the Celtics’ turn arrived.

“Pick him,” said Bill Russell, who was with Auerbach.

“Boston picks Jo Jo White of Kansas,” a grinning Auerbach announced.

A heel injury that eventually required surgery hobbled Mr. White’s last years with the Celtics.

His marriage to Estelle White ended in divorce.

“Boston will always be a part of me. That’s my home,” he said in 1979 after being traded to the Golden State Warriors, where he played until finishing his career with what was then the Kansas City Kings.

In recent years, Mr. White’s wife, Debbie, helped him recover from surgery, and he continued his association with the Celtics as director of special projects in the community relations department.

“One of the biggest joys is being with the Celtics all these years, and how they’ve embraced him,” Debbie told the Globe when they were notified about the Hall of Fame honor. “We’re just so blessed and very humbled. Now, it all comes full circle for a game that he loved, a game that he would have played for free.”

A complete list of survivors and service information were not immediately available for Mr. White, who over the years liked to revisit the magic he conjured in Game 5 of the 1976 finals.

“For inspiration sometimes, I’ll put in the tape,” he said in the Celtics’ online chat. “I still kind of get chills, even though I know every play that’s coming up. It gives me goosebumps just to watch it.”