The role of faith in sports is well-known. Basketball is no different. And now that the NBA playoffs are upon us, let's take a look at some of the sport's prominent Catholics.
Of course, to get to the NBA, coaches and players usually come through college basketball. And, as the New York Times noted in a 2018 article, "Catholic schools have long punched above their weight."
The piece explains:
There is nothing in Catholic dogma that specifically elucidates the virtues of basketball. Yet several scholars pointed to elements of American Catholicism that helped persuade schools to embrace sports.
Jesuit philosophy — embedded at so many top basketball schools, such as Gonzaga, Xavier, Creighton and Georgetown — extends to all aspects of life. It preaches cura personalis, or “care for the person” — in not only the intellectual and spiritual sense, but the physical one, too.
Catholicism in America taught that all aspects of life could be sacred, [Hofstra University religion professor Julie E.] Byrne said, maybe even basketball.
“It’s not that sports were particularly holy, but you could see it as a holy thing todo. It could have the potential to give glory to God,” said Byrne, referencing the Jesuit phrase “ad majorem Dei gloriam,” or “for the greater glory of God.”
And many of those athletes in turn came from high-school basketball -- including the many Catholic schools -- and the courts of Catholic Youth Organizations.
Able to be played indoors or on a small outdoor court, with relatively inexpensive equipment, basketball is a popular choice for schools with limited space and resources, and many Catholic schools serve lower-income and urban communities.
And the relationship between basketball and Catholic education isn't a recent phenomenon. From Jesuit publication America's review of John Gasaway's 2021 book Miracles on the Hardwood: The Hope-and-a-Prayer Story of a Winning Tradition in Catholic College Basketball:
Catholic intercollegiate athletics burgeoned, and the church soon began seeing sports as a way to enhance young men’s moral formation. In 1932, Gasaway writes, George Cardinal Mundelein of Chicago praised sports for “rescuing our boys from speakeasies, gangster hang-outs, street corners, and from the other temptations that lie in wait for discontented youth.”
At this point, I'll turn the narrative over to my colleague, former University of Notre Dame athlete and basketball fan Father Vince Kuna, C.S.C., to talk about the Catholic presence in the pro ranks (and by extension, in the Olympics, which features lots of NBA players).
Take it away, Father Vince!
The NBA playoffs are upon us. With four rounds of best of seven series to crown the world’s best, the playoffs are almost a second season, in addition to the 82-game gauntlet of a regular season.
Whereas the current game sees a uniformity of scoring styles: primarily, three-point barrages, I tend to watch the pros more in the Summer Olympics, where international rules mirror those of the 1980s and 1990s NBA.
Defenses were allotted more physicality and kept the scoring down. Duke great Coach Mike Krzyzewski -- a k a Coach K -- led Team USA to three Olympic gold medals with teams composed of elite professional players suppressing egos for the good of the team.
Coach K is a devout Catholic, very common amongst the college ranks as they serve as father-figure mentors as much as coaches.
From a story about him at St. Anthony Messenger:
“Not every kid I coach is Catholic. They use a different street to get there than the Catholic streets sometimes. But there is a core set of values and principles that you try to teach—although you don’t teach it as religion—like honesty and acceptance of responsibility, just being a good person. Faith is about living the good life and helping one another, which is teamwork,” he says.
But faith is not relegated solely to amateur basketball. Many of the recent Golden State championship teams had practicing Christians. In the Catholic world, there are notable standouts, too …
Joe Mazzulla played point guard for the West Virginia Mountaineers and led them to collegiate basketball's Final Four in 2010. They lost to the aforementioned Coach K’s Duke Blue Devils. Mazzulla now coaches the reigning NBA champion Boston Celtics.
Asked about British royalty attending a Celtics game, Mazzula famously said the only royalty he’s aware of is Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Nonplussed by nearly everything, he was glad to hear the royals might be Celtics’ fans.
Before NBA Finals games last year, he was often seen walking about TD Garden’s famous parquet floor, praying the Rosary.
Gordon Hayward, playing for Butler University, almost made a half-court buzzer beater that would have propelled his school past Duke in the 2010 championship game.
Hayward was a bit of a journeyman, playing for four NBA teams for fourteen seasons, the longest tenure coming with the Utah Jazz.
Hayward grew up a Christian and said he always plays “for the glory of God.” Last year, he was received into the Catholic Church by a bishop in Rome.
One of the greatest NBA players of all-time, the late Kobe Bryant was a practicing Catholic and a parishioner at Our Lady Queen of Angels in Newport Beach, California.
He leaned into his faith when experiencing legal troubles, seeking the spiritual counsel of his parish priest. Bryant won an Oscar for producing an animated short portraying his love for the game soon after his retirement.
As outlined in this piece by Catholic Answers, Bryant was not a perfect person with an unspotted past (the reason the Church offers the Sacrament of Reconciliation):
Let us strive to remain in a state of grace ourselves and hasten to confession when needed. That’s how we win the spiritual battle. We win when we confess that, at times, we have lost. Kobe’s story is a reminder that one never knows how many seconds are left on the clock in this world.
So, as St. Paul (who was fond of using sports metaphors) might say, let’s play the game of life in order to win. For us, that means becoming saints—the best version of ourselves. As Kobe once asked of some less-than-committed Lakers teammates, “If you’re not here to win, why are you here?”
As St. Augustine -- the spiritual father of new Pope Leo XIV -- famously observed: “The Church is not a museum for saints, it is a hospital for sinners.”
And sometimes, that hospital comes with a basketball hoop.
Bryant attended Mass with his daughter Gianna the morning of their fatal helicopter crash in 2020.
My fondest memory of him was his clutch shooting performance in the waning moments of the gold medal game against Spain in 2008. He and Coach K led the Redeem Team to the championship after Team USA settled for bronze four years prior.
I still watch highlights of that game to this day. It gives me pride and a few tears.
Image: Adobe Stock
Click here to visit Father Vince Kuna’s IMDB page.
Kate O’Hare, a longtime entertainment journalist, is Social Media Content Manager and Blog Editor at Family Theater Productions.
Recent posts:
'The Last Rodeo': Catholic Neal McDonough Rides Bulls (& Kisses a Girl)
'Mission: Impossible' Movies: There's a Lot of Catholic Stuff in There
With Narnia Coming to Netflix, C.S. Lewis' Fantastical World Endures
Keep up with Family Theater Productions on our website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.