William "Pop" Gates (August 30, 1917 – December 1, 1999) was an American professional basketball player. He was born in Decatur, Alabama and attended high school in New York, New York. After playing college basketball at Clark Atlanta University, he continued his basketball career in New York City with the Harlem Renaissance, for several years beginning in 1938–39. He became one of the early black players in the NBL in 1946. Later he played for and coached the Harlem Globetrotters. Gates is one the few athletes who went directly from a high school championship team (Benjamin Franklin, New York, 1938) to a World Professional Champion (Rens, 1939).
Gates was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a player in 1989.
Famous quotes containing the words pop and/or gates:
“Every man has been brought up with the idea that decent women don’t pop in and out of bed; he has always been told by his mother that “nice girls don’t.” He finds, of course, when he gets older that this may be untrue—but only in a certain section of society.”
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