NE Basketball Hall of Fame at Keaney GymNew England, where the game of basketball was invented in 1891, is about to get its own regional basketball hall of fame. The newly created New England Basketball Hall of Fame, to be housed at Keaney Gymnasium on the Kingston Campus, will see its first class of inductees honored next fall. Unlike the National Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., this one will honor only players, coaches and others who were involved in the sport in New England.
Dan Doyle, the founder and executive director of the Institute for International Sport at URI, conceived the New England Basketball Hall of Fame. Doyle said: “An important objective of the New England Basketball Hall of Fame is to honor a wide variety of individuals and teams whose important contributions have been at the heart of New England basketball success.”
Keaney Gymnasium is named for the legendary former coach, Frank Keaney, who is credited with revolutionizing basketball by devising the fast break in the 1930s, and for turning then Rhode Island State into a national basketball power in the ‘30s and ‘40s. R.I. Architect Ken Filarski, who designed the International Scholar-Athlete Hall of Fame on the URI campus, has been commissioned to design the exhibit area of Keaney Gymnasium for the Hall of Fame.
For more information on the Hall of Fame, visit www.internationalsport.com
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