Basketball Hall of Fame ceremony: Start time, channel, how to watch and stream

Villanova men’s basketball coach Jay Wright will take his spot along the game’s greats when he is inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Saturday night.

“When I got the call, it was stunning, it was emotional,” Wright told The Inquirer. “It’s very humbling and something I’m trying to come to grips with right now, to be honest.”

Of course, it should not have come to much surprise to the well-dressed Wright, who remains one of the greatest head coaches in college basketball history. During his 27-year coaching career — 20 at Villanova and seven at Hofstra — Wright has won 612 games and two national championships in 2016 and 2018. And there are no signs he plans on calling it quits anytime soon.

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Wright, 59, will join 15 other Hall of Fame inductees during a ceremony on Saturday night that will air on NBA TV beginning at 7 p.m, though the network’s coverage will start with a red carpet show at 6 p.m. hosted by Matt Winer alongside Kristen Ledlow, Steve Smith and Stephanie Ready.

Presenting Wright will be three Hall of Famers with deep ties to Philadelphia basketball — former Sixers great Charles Barkley, soon-to-be-retired Thomas Jefferson University coach Herb Magee, and Delco coaching legend George Raveling.

A number of well-known former NBA players will be inducted alongside Wright, including Chris Bosh, Paul Pierce, Chris Webber, and Ben Wallace (who will be presented by former Sixers coach Larry Brown). Among the other headliners are former NBA coach Rick Adelman, two-time Olympic gold medalist Yolanda Griffith and three-time WNBA MVP Lauren Jackson.

Another notable inductee is NBA legend Bill Russell, who was first inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1975 as a player. He’s being voted in again for his coaching career, in part because he became the first Black head coach in NBA history when he took over the Celtics job in 1966. Russell will be just the fifth person to be elected into the Hall of Fame as a player and a coach (John Wooden, Bill Sharman, Lenny Wilkens, and Tom Heinsohn are the other four).

NBA legend Michael Jordan will also be on hand for the event as a presenter for former Bulls teammate and golfing buddy Toni Kukoč. It might be an awkward moment, as Kukoč’s other presenter is Bulls chairman Jerry Reinsdorf, who was painted in an unfavorable light in Jordan’s ESPN documentary The Last Dance for breaking up the team after the 1998 season.

Here’s everything you need to know to watch or stream tonight’s ceremony:

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