Paul Dawkins

Paul Dawkins — Biography

Eight seasons at Galatasaray earned American basketball player Paul Dawkins the status of a club "legend". He is remembered for his number 13 shirt and still holds the title of the club's longest-serving foreign basketball player. While at Galatasaray he became a Turkish citizen, in 1984. He died in March 2019.

Born in Saginaw, Michigan, he hung a rim made from coat hangers in the family garage at the age of nine and became known for his left-handed shooting. At Northern Illinois University from 1975 to 1979 he graduated as the school's all-time leading scorer with 1,749 points, was the Mid-American Conference Player of the Year as a senior and finished fifth in the country in scoring; fans called him "Doctor D", the "doctor" nickname having earlier been used for Julius Erving as "Doctor J". He was picked in the tenth round of the 1979 draft by the Utah Jazz and averaged 5.5 points in 57 NBA games, then played for the Anchorage Northern Knights in the CBA in 1980-81.

He joined Galatasaray at 24 and averaged 37 points a game in 1982-83; his average over eight years in Turkey was above 31. He was part of the back-to-back championships of 1984-85 and 1985-86 and played an important role in the 1985 President's Cup win over Fenerbahçe. He retired in 1990 and was inducted into the Northern Illinois University Athletics Hall of Fame in 1991 and the Saginaw County Sports Hall of Fame in 2007.