Bill Russell, perhaps the greatest basketball player of all time, dies at 88

Bill Russell was a late bloomer. Before the college basketball accolades and a pair of national championships, before the 11 NBA titles and five MVP’s, before he became the most fearsome defensive player ever and a man firmly entrenched in the conversation for the greatest player of all time, there was a gangly, 5-foot-10 kid from Oakland’s McClymonds High School who believed a job in the shipyards was in his future.

There proved to be so much more.

William Felton Russell died Sunday with his wife Jeannine at his side. He was 88. The greatest winner in professional sports — Russell’s 11 championships in 13 seasons is a mark unlikely to ever be matched — Russell’s decorated career included 12 All-Star appearances and an Olympic gold medal in 1956. He was at his best in the biggest moments: In 30 elimination games at the college, pro and Olympic levels, Russell was a staggering 28-2.

Said Tommy Heinsohn, a teammate of Russell’s in Boston: “He would do superhuman things when they needed to be done.”

Russell was born on Feb. 12, 1934, in Monroe, Louisiana, where racism was deep seeded. Russell’s parents, Charlie and Katie, knew people there who had been born slaves; black men and women were forced to wait in line behind whites at places like drug stores and gas stations, and Katie Russell, dressed in a new suit she made for herself, was once stopped by police and told not to wear “white women clothes,” according to a feature on Russell written in 2001.

Russell’s family moved to Oakland in the 1940s, where basketball first took hold. Russell was a gifted athlete — his Celtics teammate, John Havlicek, said Russell could have been a champion decathlete — but basketball came slowly. As a sophomore at McClymonds, Russell was nearly cut from the junior varsity team. He suited up for only half the games that…