Albert White (born June 13, 1977) is an American former professional basketball player. White played in a variety of domestic and foreign basketball leagues. In high school, he was one of the most highly decorated basketball players in the United States. In college, he achieved success after transferring from University of Michigan to University of Missouri, but his success did not lead him to the National Basketball Association (henceforth NBA). Instead, he went to the Continental Basketball Association (CBA) and has since played in various developmental and foreign basketball leagues as a professional.
In high school, he was a Street & Smith, Parade, and McDonald's All-American and in college he became a first team All-Big 12 Conference player and CNN/Sports Illustrated Big 12 Player of the Year. White was implicated in the University of Michigan basketball scandal, but was not named in the final indictments. He transferred from Michigan to Missouri after his freshman year, which included the basketball scandal, for unrelated reasons. He achieved several firsts for Missouri and led the team to their best season in the Big 12 era in 1998–99.
He declared himself eligible for the 1999 NBA draft as a redshirt junior and went undrafted. He was drafted in the 1999 CBA draft. He has had multiple stints in the CBA, United States Basketball League (USBL), International Basketball League (IBL) and various foreign leagues. As a professional, he once was named to the All-CBA second team. He was selected as an All-star or All-league player and been part of championship teams in several of the professional leagues he played in.
White transferred to the Missouri Tigers men's basketball team due to a clash with Steve Fisher after his freshman year with the Michigan Wolverines men's basketball team.[8] White left the team for what was described as disciplinary reasons.[12] White, who averaged 9.0 points and 4.7 rebounds, had been one of the most improved players during the previous season. He averaged eleven points and seven rebounds during the final seven Big Ten Conference games.[13] Nonetheless, he was suspended for the first semester in October 1996 for violating a team rule.[13][14]
During the 1998–99 season he became the first Missouri Tigers player to lead the team in scoring, rebounds and assists in the same season, and he placed in the top five in the Big 12 in both scoring and rebounding.[4][18] That season he helped the Missouri Tigers snap the Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball team's 35 game home conference winning streak which had extended from February 20, 1994, to January 1999.[19] That season he was twice named Big 12 men's basketball player of the week and made the official All-Big 12 first team.[17]CNN/Sports Illustrated named White the Player of the Year in the Big 12.[20] However, he lost the official conference player of the year award to Venson Hamilton,[17] and he was only listed as a second team All-Big 12 player by the Associated Press.[21]
After his redshirt junior season, he declared himself eligible for the 1999 NBA draft with one year of collegiate eligibility remaining, making him the first Missouri Tiger to declare early for the NBA draft.[22][23][24] Although some speculated that he was making a mistake declaring early for the draft, he had the burden of child support and some projected him as a likely draft selection.[25][26][27] White went undrafted in the NBA draft after surrendering his final year of eligibility. However, that year some other early draft entrants met with better success: the first four selections (Elton Brand, Steve Francis, Baron Davis, and Lamar Odom) also had surrendered some remaining collegiate eligibility by declaring themselves eligible to be drafted in the NBA draft and high schoolers Jonathan Bender and Leon Smith were drafted in the first round.[20][28] Many other underclassmen in his draft year such as Ron Artest, Richard Hamilton, and Corey Maggette have gone on to have successful NBA careers.[29]
^"HAL SCHRAM MR. BASKETBALL". MICHIGAN HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL RECORD BOOK. Archived from the original on September 27, 2008. Retrieved August 19, 2008.
