Lakers News: Two Showtime Lakers Legends Nominated For Basketball Hall Of Fame

Pau Gasol may not be the only Laker headed to Springfield next year.

Two other Los Angeles Lakers legends hailing from the team's unforgettable Showtime era could be joining Pau Gasol in the 2023 class of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame: defensive stalwart Michael Cooper and former head coach Paul Westhead.

Pau. Coop. Coach Westhead.

Congrats to our 2023 Hall of Fame candidates! pic.twitter.com/shswFO6PL8

— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) December 21, 2022

Michael Cooper has been nominated three times for the Hall since 2020. Though never an All-Star, the 6'7" shooting guard was the 1987 Defensive Player of the Year, and served as a critical part for all five Showtime Lakers title teams in the 1980s. His lockdown defense on the wing proved essential for L.A., and was recognized across the rest of the league as well: Coop was a five-time All-Defensive First Team honoree and a three-time All-Defensive Second Teamer. After being drafted with the 60th pick in the 1978 draft out of the University of New Mexico, Cooper spent all 12 his NBA seasons in Los Angeles.

Cooper has since become a major head coach in his own right, though he has been nominated as a player. He served as a Lakers assistant coach from 1994-1996, then moved over to the WNBA, where he became the Los Angeles Sparks' head coach from 2000-04, winning back-to-back league titles in 2001 and 2002. He also won a title leading then-D League club the Albuquerque Thunderbirds (now the Cleveland Cavaliers' NBAGL affiliate team, the Cleveland Charge). Cooper has also coached the Denver Nuggets as an assistant coach and briefly as an interim head coach, the USC women's basketball team, the Atlanta Dream of the WNBA, and now high school clubs in the greater Los Angeles area.

After serving as the head coach for the La Salle University men's basketball team for nine seasons, from 1970-79, Paul Westhead was initially hired as the only assistant coach on Jack McKinney's staff for the 1979-80 season, during the first year of both Dr. Jerry Buss's and Magic Johnson's L.A. tenure. 

When McKinney was laid out in a major bicycle accident, Westhead was pressed into service as the club's head coach, and the team eventually went on to finish with a 60-22 record and a six-game NBA Finals victory over Julius Irving and the rest of the Philadelphia 76ers. L.A. eventually ousted Westhead just 11 games into the 1981-82 season (the Lakers were off to a pretty good 7-4 start), replacing him with his assistant coach, former Lakers role player Pat Riley, who wound up being... pretty good.

Westhead, 83, went on to enjoy a lengthy head coaching career in the NBA, college and WNBA, and also had stints coaching in the NBA G League (then the D-League) and Japan. Westhead later coached the Chicago Bulls and Denver Nuggets as a head coach, and the Golden State Warriors, Orlando Magic and Seattle Supersonics/Oklahoma City Thunder as an assistant. For the WNBA, he coached the Phoenix Mercury from 2006-2007, winning a title in his second season. At the college level, he enjoyed a memorable run at Loyola Marymount from 1985-1990, and also had gigs at George Mason University, and the University of Oregon.

Nominations do not mean that either Cooper or Westhead has actually been selected to the Hall. Pau Gasol has the resume, both in the NBA and with his international trailblazing, to make it in as a first ballot inclusion. Time will tell if Cooper and Westhead ultimately make the final grade, but it's exciting to see them recognized in this initial group.