Springfield Native and Former NBA Player Travis Best at Springfield College

Springfield College VP for Communications/External Affairs Steve Roulier talks with Springfield native and former NBA player Travis Best about the excitement of the @HoophallClassic and playing at Blake Arena.

Perhaps no player or team in Western Mass. basketball history, however, captured the attention of a city and a region as completely as the 1990-91 Central squad, led by a young point guard from the city: Travis Best.

In all three of his varsity seasons, Best won the John "Honey" Lahovich Award as the best player in Western Mass., leading the Golden Eagles to a 69-4 overall record, three WMass Division I titles, two trips to the state final and one state championship in 1991.

Arguably the most memorable game in Best's high-school basketball career, however, was a regular season game against city rival Putnam in which he scored a Western Mass. single-game record 81 points.

Info courtesy of Masslive.com.

Following a successful collegiate career at Georgia Tech, Best was drafted 23rd in the 1995 NBA Draft by the Indiana Pacers. He went on to play for the Pacers, the Chicago Bulls, the Miami Heat, the Dallas Mavericks and the New Jersey Nets.