A scoring machine for his era Richie Guerin is often over looked by fans of today’s game. But he’s one of the top 10 players to ever put on a New York Knicks uniform and had himself a spectacular NBA career. Guerin joined the Marines before he was even finished with high school in 1947. He served in the Marines from 1947-1954, even attending Iona college while a member of the Marines. He had a solid career at Ionia playing 3 seasons and appearing in 69 games with a 20 points per contest average. He graduated and finished his active duty in 1954, and was drafted by the 8th pick in the draft by the New York Knicks. Guerin joined a bad Knicks franchise and they rarely improved during his stint. The team had talent but made the playoffs only once while Guerin played for them. He played in all 72 games as a rookie averaging 10 points a contest.

Early in the 1963-64 season the Knicks traded Guerin to the St Louis Hawks. With the Hawks he’d no longer be the superstar he was with the Knicks but would become a solid player, and get to play in the playoffs on a regular occasion.

After one season as a solely a player for the Hawks he became a player coach. The team seen a lot of success with him as the coach and his production started to drop off as he focused more on coaching. He did however, play two full seasons as a player coach before retiring in 1967 to focus full-time on coaching.

The Hawks left Guerin unprotected in the expansion draft and he was picked up by the Seattle Supersonics who than traded him back to the Hawks. Guerin would come out of retirement for short stints in 1969 and 1970 before finally calling it a career.

In 848 career games Guerin owns career averages of 17 points 5 rebounds and 5 assists. He also was a six time all-star.

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