A legend to the city of Dallas and the Mavericks organization, Dirk Nowitzki did it all. From multiple All-Star appearances to winning the first NBA title in franchise history, the Germinator recently appeared on The Big Podcast with Shaq. Reminiscing the story of when he ‘supposedly’ dropped 50 points on Charles Barkley, Scottie Pippen, and Team USA as an 18-year-old, Nowitzki also addressed Barkley’s Auburn statement.
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He bluntly mentioned how the Philadelphia 76ers legend wanted him to attend his alma mater, Auburn University, which was never in the cards for the 18-year-old since he had to serve in the German Army.
“I’ve heard Charles tell this story a million times. It gets better with his Auburn and which, well I would have never gone to Auburn, of course. And the story changed a few times over the years. I think one time I had 50 at halftime. Obviously, I didn’t even have that many but it was fun to basically compete against some of my heroes.”
Nowitzki had mentioned that during those games against Team USA, he was actually serving in the German Army since it was compulsory during those years. So, he would not have been able to attend Auburn even if he wanted to.
Chuck witnessed greatness in the making and wanted Nowtizki to be a part of Auburn University, where Barkley spent his formidable years before making it into the NBA.
However, the European was already a part of a second-division German professional team named DJK Würzburg, where the seven-footer had already started playing at the age of 16. Further, as a rookie, he wanted to adopt Chuck’s Team USA jersey no. as a homage to the legend.
Dirk Nowitzki wanted to pay homage to Charles Barkley
Despite not being interested in playing for Charles Barkley’s alma mater, Nowitzki had immense respect for the Philadelphia 76ers legend. So much so that he shared his desire to wear number 14 with the Dallas Mavericks since Barkley had number 14 in the Team USA Olympic team while on the sets of Inside The NBA.
“Charles wore number 14 in the Olympics in Barcelona and I absolutely loved Charles…So, I switched to number 14 and that’s what I stuck with internationally…When I came to Dallas, I wanted 14 but Robert Pack was like, ‘Hell no, rookie.’”
Nowitzki mentioned how Pack did not want to shoot for the number either and that’s what led Dirk to switch the numbers and number 41 went down in the history books as best associated with the Dallas Mavericks legend.
