The Sam Jones NCCU statue will do something no championship banner or box score ever could. It will give visitors to McDougald-McLendon Arena a permanent, physical reminder of where a 10-time NBA champion’s basketball journey actually started.
North Carolina Central plans to unveil the sculpture prior to the Eagles’ men’s basketball game against South Carolina State, according to HBCU Gameday. Family members and friends of Jones, along with university officials, will take part in the ceremony. The sculpture stands 30 inches tall and 22 inches wide and was created by award-winning Vermont-based artist Douglas Aja. After the unveiling, it will stay on permanent display inside the arena.
Who Sam Jones was before the Celtics
Before Sam Jones became one of the most decorated players in NBA history, he was an Eagle. The Wilmington, North Carolina, native played at North Carolina Central across two stints — first from 1951 to 1954, then again in 1956-57. He averaged 17.8 points per game over 98 contests under legendary coaches John McLendon and Floyd Brown. That coaching lineage matters. McLendon is himself a Hall of Fame figure in basketball history. Jones learned the game directly under him before taking it to the professional level.
Boston selected Jones eighth overall in the first round of the 1957 NBA Draft. That pick launched one of the most decorated careers the league has ever seen. Jones spent all 12 seasons of his professional career with the Celtics. He left with 10 NBA championships to show for it, a total matched by almost no one in league history.
The numbers behind “Mr. Clutch”
Jones earned the nickname “Mr. Clutch” for a reason. He finished his career with 15,411 points, 4,305 rebounds, and 2,209 assists across 871 games. He made five NBA All-Star teams and earned three All-NBA Second Team selections. His championship total ranks second all-time, behind only his own Celtics teammate, Bill Russell. That places Jones in some of the most exclusive company professional basketball has ever produced.
Jones’ recognition extended well beyond his playing days, too. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and into the North Carolina Central Athletics Hall of Fame in 1984. He also earned spots in the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame, the NAIA Hall of Fame, and the CIAA Hall of Fame. The NBA itself has recognized him three separate times as part of its 25th, 50th, and 75th anniversary teams, most recently landing him on the league’s Top 75 list. HBCU Buzz has covered similar honors for HBCU basketball legends through its ongoing HBCU basketball history coverage.
Why the Sam Jones NCCU statue matters now
Jones died in December 2021 at age 88. That makes this unveiling a posthumous tribute rather than something he’ll see in person. That timing gives the ceremony extra weight. Family members attending the event will be honoring a legacy rather than celebrating alongside the man himself. The sculpture becomes something closer to a permanent memorial than a typical honor for a living alum.
The Sam Jones NCCU statue also arrives at a moment when HBCUs are increasingly claiming physical space for their own sports history. That history shouldn’t live only in record books and championship banners elsewhere. A statue inside McDougald-McLendon Arena does something a plaque or a jersey retirement can’t quite match. It puts Jones’ likeness permanently in the building where his career actually began. Every player and fan who walks through the doors going forward will see it. HBCU Buzz has tracked similar campus tributes across the conference in its MEAC basketball coverage.
What the ceremony means for NCCU basketball
Timing the unveiling around a home game against South Carolina State gives the moment a built-in audience, rather than treating it as a standalone campus event. Fans arriving for a MEAC matchup will get history alongside basketball. It ties Jones’ legacy directly to the program he helped put on the map, decades before either school played in that conference.
For North Carolina Central, the statue is more than a tribute to one alum’s career. It’s a statement about what the program considers worth remembering permanently. Not just banners hanging from the rafters, but a lasting physical presence that puts Sam Jones’ story in front of every future Eagle who steps onto that court.
That kind of permanent tribute also carries weight beyond NCCU’s own campus. Jones played his college ball in an era when HBCU basketball routinely produced players who went on to reshape the professional game, even when the broader sports world was slow to credit where that talent actually came from. A statue doesn’t rewrite that history, but it does make sure the connection between Jones and NCCU stays visible for as long as the arena stands, rather than fading into a footnote in Celtics record books that rarely mention where his game was built.
