Jim Ligon

Kokomo basketball fans who thought they’d never see another scorer like JimRayl when he left for Indiana University in 1959 didn’t have long to wait after all.

In the fall of that year Ligon showed up in Joe Platt’s basketball camp as a promising sophomore. By the time he left in the spring of 1962, he had become the county’s all-time leading career boys scorer with 1,900 points (a mark that stands 41 years later) and he’d led the Kats to the school’s first and only boys state championship.

Ligon also gave fervent Kokomo fans something they’d never had before – a 6-foot-8 center who could score, rebound and run the court every bit as fluently as his teammates. This was no ordinary basketball center, but rather one of the school’s greatest athletes ever as fans would later see when he was named first-team all-state in football as a senior. As a junior, Ligon teamed with Indiana All-Stars Ron Hughes and Richie Scott to help bring Kokomo its long-awaited state crown. Playing against an outstanding Indianapolis Manual team that featured future Indiana University and NBA stars Dick and Tom Van Arsdale, Kokomo won in overtime. Ligon fouled out with 19 points and 18 rebounds.

A year later, Ligon carried his team to the Final Four where the Kats fell 74-73 to East Chicago Washington in a game where he scored 25 points. Ligon enjoyed an outstanding professional career with the Louisville Colonels of the American Basketball Association. He starred five seasons in Louisville and in 1969 was named to the ABA East All Stars. Ligon later played for the Pittsburgh Condors and Virginia Squires before suffering a career-ending ruptured Achilles tendon.

“I played with the greatest players, Dr. J (Julius Erving), and Spencer Haywood,” Ligon said in 1999 when the Kokomo Tribune named him the fifth greatest Howard County athlete of all-time. “I played against Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Rick Barry. I felt good that I was a great player and could hang in there with some of the greatest players of all time.”