Pervis Ellison
American basketball player (born 1967)
Pervis Ellison (born April 3, 1967) is an American former National Basketball Association (NBA) player. Nicknamed "Never Nervous Pervis" for his clutch play with the University of Louisville, after leading Louisville to a national championship, Ellison was the first overall pick in the 1989 NBA Draft. His professional career was largely hindered by injuries, though he won the NBA Most Improved Player Award in 1992.
Collegiate career
At 6 ft 9 in (2.06 m), 242 lb (110 kg), he started all four years as the center under coach Denny Crum. In his freshman year he led Louisville to its second national championship, scoring a game-leading 25 points and adding 11 rebounds in the 72-69 championship win over Duke, and was then named the Most Outstanding Player—the second time a freshman had ever been awarded that honor, after Arnie Ferrin in 1944 for Utah.
Professional career
Ellison was made the first overall pick in the 1989 NBA draft by the Sacramento Kings. Teammate Danny Ainge gave Ellison the nickname "Out of Service Pervis" for the many injuries that would plague him during his professional career. An injury kept him on the sidelines for 48 of 82 games of his rookie year, after which he was traded to the Washington Bullets in a three-team trade involving the Utah Jazz that also sent Jeff Malone to the Jazz and Eric Leckner, Bob Hansen, and draft picks to the Kings. On April 6, 1991, Ellison scored a career-best 30 points while adding 12 rebounds in a win over the Indiana Pacers. Although he sometimes played as a backup in 1990–1991, the following year he became a full time starter and earned Most Improved Player honors after averaging 20.0 points, 11.4 rebounds and 2.68 blocks per game.
“Pervis Ellison” enters the record as american basketball player (born 1967). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Pervis, Ellison and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Pervis Ellison” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Pervis, Ellison and American provides the most credible route into that argument.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q180860. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1967, 1989, 1992 and 1944.
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This entry incorporates text from “Pervis Ellison” 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.