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Between his freshman and sophomore years at the all-Negro Crispus Attucks* High School, Oscar sprouted six inches to a weedy 6 ft. 2 in. (Oscar's height, the family insists, was inherited from a 6-ft. sin. great-grandfather, who was born a slave, died in 1954 at 116, reputedly the oldest U.S. citizen.) Playing against some of the best competition in the nation, Oscar made all-state three years, led his team to a 45-game winning streak and two state championships. Says Crispus Attucks' Coach Ray Crowe: "Oscar was good enough in high school to play pro ball."
Against the Grain. The 75 colleges that were after Oscar called so often that his father had the phone disconnected three times. Oscar finally chose the University of Cincinnati, partly because it was fairly close to home, mainly because it played a big-time schedule that hit Madison Square Garden, where he could test his game against the very best. Even after he had landed Robertson, Cincinnati Coach George Smith fretted that someone would steal his protégé. "Every time Oscar left town," recalls Teammate Ralph Davis, who also moved up to the Royals from Cincinnati, "Smith would start phoning campuses to see if he had been stolen."
Robertson was a prize well worth hijacking. In high school he had ranked a solid 16th in a class of 171, but at Cincinnati his grades in business administration fell off to C; Oscar had come to play basketball. He kept at least four basketballs in his room. "When the dribbling stopped," says Davis, who lived next door, "you knew Oscar had gone to bed." By this time Oscar had come to have a paternally protective feeling about a basketball, once chewed out a university publicity man for casually bouncing a ball on the pavement. "You'll ruin that ball. You'll rub off the grain and throw it off balance."
Bank Draft. As a sophomore, making his very first start in Madison Square Garden, Robertson scored 56 points, at the time the biggest night anyone—college or pro—had ever had in that shrine of basketball. Playing forward throughout his college career, Robertson set 14 major national marks, including a game average of 33.8 points. By the time he graduated last spring, he had become the only college player to lead the nation's scorers for three straight years.
Robertson was still a sophomore when he was claimed, under the N.B.A.'s territorial rule, by the Cincinnati Royals, who then sat back nervously to see if he would graduate before the team went bankrupt. Robertson made it just in time, drove a hard bargain with the Royals, who realized that he could always peddle his spectacular talents to the showboating, all-Negro Globetrotters. His three-year contract calls for an annual salary of about $33,000, plus a percentage of the gate that should boost the total take to around $50,000.