Lucien James LongleyAM (born 19 January 1969) is an Australian professional basketball coach and former player. He was the first Australian to play in the National Basketball Association (NBA), where he played for four teams over 10 seasons.[1] He most notably played for the Chicago Bulls, with whom he won three championships from 1996 to 1998. Longley represented Australia as a player at three Olympic Games in 1988, 1992 and 2000; he has worked as an assistant coach for the Australian national basketball team.
Longley began his career in Australia with a brief stint playing for the Perth Wildcats of the National Basketball League (NBL) in 1986. He played collegiately for the New Mexico Lobos and was drafted 7th overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves in the 1991 NBA draft. He played three middling seasons with the Timberwolves before he was traded to the Bulls in 1994. He became the Bulls' starting centre during their historic 1995–96 season when they set the NBA record for most wins in a regular season with 72. Longley was an important component of the team's success and stayed in the Bulls' starting lineup during their championship three-peat. After the demise of the Bulls after their 1998 championship win, he had brief stints playing with the Phoenix Suns and New York Knicks.
Early life and career
Longley was born 19 January 1969[2] in Melbourne, Victoria, to Sue (née Hansen) and Richard Longley. Longley's father is an architect who stood 6 ft 10 in (2.08 m) tall and represented Australia at international level in basketball,[3] including being a member of two Olympic squads.[4] His mother, who is 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) tall, is an equestrian who has been divorced from Richard since 1984 and lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States.[5] Longley has two brothers, Sam, a journalist and actor, and Griffin, also a journalist who also played briefly for the Perth Wildcats.
Longley grew up in Fremantle, Western Australia. At the age of 16 he was a member of the Australian Under-19 side and the following year, 1986, he joined the Wildcats, with whom he played two games.[6]
Longley was recruited out of Scotch College in Perth by the University of New Mexico's basketball coach, Gary Colson, who went to Perth to recruit Longley's childhood friend Andrew Vlahov, who ended up attending Stanford University.[5] Vlahov and Longley both played their junior basketball for the Perth Redbacks on the same team. Longley attended college at the University of New Mexico, from 1987 to 1991, where he averaged 19.1 points, 9.2 rebounds and 3.6 assists in his senior year. He helped New Mexico reach the NCAA Tournament in 1991.[7] At nineteen he was a member of the national team for the Seoul Olympics, where they finished fourth, at the time the best result an Australian senior men's basketball team had achieved in Olympic competition.
Longley also spent time at the Australian Institute of Sport in 1986 and 1987 (before heading to New Mexico) under the coaching of Australian Boomers head coach Adrian Hurley, attending the AIS with Vlahov and another emerging basketball player from Adelaide, Mark Bradtke. Throughout the 1990s, the trio formed the nucleus of the Australian Boomers front court with Longley at centre, 6'10" (208 cm) Bradtke at power forward, and 6'7" (201 cm) Vlahov at small forward.
When Longley returned home to Perth during college breaks, he regularly suited up for the Perth Redbacks, helping the team to win consecutive State Basketball League (SBL) championships in 1989 and 1990.
NBA career
Minnesota Timberwolves
Longley was drafted 7th overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves in 1991.[8] After long contract negotiations that were still going on when the 1991–92 NBA season started and actually prevented him from playing for the first month, he made his NBA debut for the Timberwolves on 30 November 1991.[9] In 1992, he again represented Australia at the Barcelona Olympics. After two-plus mediocre seasons with the struggling franchise, the 7 ft 2 in (2.18 m)[1]center was traded to the Chicago Bulls for Stacey King late in the 1993–94 season.
Chicago Bulls
Longley became the Bulls' starting center. He won three straight championships with the Bulls from 1996 to 1998, becoming the first Australian player to win an NBA title and the only to have won three championships. After he played 55 games from the bench in 1994–95, Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson made him the starting center in 1995–96. Post-season surgery to his left ankle and the recovery time forced him to miss playing for the Australian Boomers at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.
Longley missed almost two months of the 1996–97 season after dislocating his shoulder while body surfing at Hermosa Beach near the team's hotel after a game in Los Angeles.[10] In a 2014 interview on Australian television, Longley joked that after a month he began receiving phone calls from Michael Jordan telling him to get back on court soon because he had no one to set screens for him.[11]
Phoenix Suns
After the breakup of the Bulls roster after the 1997–98 season, Chicago did a sign-and-trade deal with Longley, sending him to the Phoenix Suns[12] for Mark Bryant, Martin Müürsepp, Bubba Wells, and a conditional first-round draft pick.[13]
Luc Longley made his international debut for the Australia national basketball team in 1988 and would be, whenever possible, the preferred starting centre for the next 12 years. He appeared in three Summer Olympic Games (1988, 1992 and 2000) as well as at the 1990 FIBA World Championship. Unfortunately, injury prevented him from playing for Australia at the 1996 Olympic games as well as the 1994 and 1998FIBA World Championships.
Longley has spoken of the importance of the Australian Boomers to his growth as a player, citing it as the reason he wanted to return to the national program as an assistant coach; he would later become the assistant coach of the Australian men's national basketball team from 2013 to 2019.[22][23]
Personal life
Longley was married to an American, Kelly Yates,[24] whom he met while he was attending college in Albuquerque and they have two daughters.[25] He married an Australian, Anna Gare, a former musician and current television presenter, in 2008.[26] The Longley family are well known in the Fremantle, Western Australia area, to the extent that a 25-year-old, then Chicago Bulls player, Longley was present at the Fremantle Football Club's unveiling and launch at the Fremantle Port. He cited Fremantle at the time as "one of the world's great spots".[citation needed]
In 1996, Longley bought a house in Riverwoods, Illinois.[27] Also in 1996, he wrote a book, Running with the Bulls, about the 1995–96 season; Bulls coach Phil Jackson wrote the foreword.[28]
On 6 April 2007, Longley's $2 million home in Fremantle[29] was destroyed by a fire.[30][31] It was initially believed that much of Longley's memorabilia from his basketball career was lost, although he later said he only lost his 1996 team photo.[32] He then bought a warehouse on a nearby street which Gare's father, an architect, converted into a house for their needs. In 2015, the couple moved to a property near the coastal Western Australian town of Denmark.[33]
In December 2009 Longley, who had previously participated in marine conservation efforts, named a newly discovered shrimp species Lebbeus clarehannah after his 15-year-old daughter.[34] His wife's sister Sophie is married to British comedian Ben Elton.
