Joe Ruklick
American basketball player (1938-2020)
Joseph Wayne Ruklick ( RUCK-lik; August 3, 1938 – September 17, 2020) was an American professional basketball player for the Philadelphia Warriors of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He played college basketball for the Northwestern Wildcats and was an All-American in 1959. Ruklick was selected by Philadelphia in the second round of the 1959 NBA draft. He was known for passing the ball for the assist on Warriors teammate Wilt Chamberlain's final score en route to his NBA record 100-point game.
Early life
Ruklick was born in Chicago, but he moved to an orphanage in Princeton, Illinois, after his mother was diagnosed with tuberculosis when he was 11. He attended Princeton High School, leading the team to consecutive state tournaments in 1954 and 1955.
College career
Ruklick attended Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He played three seasons with the Wildcats, leading the team in both scoring and rebounds each year. Ruklick averaged 23 points and 13 rebounds as a senior in 1958–59, when he was named a third-team All-American by the Associated Press and National Association of Basketball Coaches. He finished with career averages of 19.9 points and 13.2 rebounds per game.
The public source identifies “Joe Ruklick” as american basketball player (1938-2020). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Ruklick, American and basketball.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3808693. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1938, 2020, 1959 and 1954.
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This entry incorporates text from “Joe Ruklick” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.