Coming out of Hamburg High School in Arkansas, Scottie Pippen was a pretty good high school player.

However, the problem with playing at the next level was that Pippen was relatively short, at 6-1 and even more problematic, he was slight at just 150lbs. Due to his stature, Pippen was barely recruited much less offered any scholarships.

From Team Manager to NBA Draft Pick

Pippen’s trajectory from small town star to college star to NBA Draft Pick is one of the NBA’s more unlikeliest stories. As an outgoing high school senior, no one believed that Pippen would become the player he ultimately became. Not even Scottie himself would have believed it — as we saw him say in the ESPN’s “The Last Dance” documentary. We’ll speak more to that in a minute.

The college that did take a chance on Pippen was an in-state NAIA school – the University of Central Arkansas. Even then Coach Don Dyer thought Scottie needed some time to develop and build his upper body strength, so he proposed to Pippen being the basketball team’s manager his first year.

Without many other options and just wanting to play basketball, Pippen accepted Dyer’s offer and made his way to the campus located in Conway, Arkansas. As expected, he wasn’t on the team, but when several members of the team left the team, Pippen convinced his coach to give him one of the scholarships. It worked. Pippen ended up playing on the team his freshmen year. As a reserve, he averaged 4.3 points a game, but made an impression on the coaching staff with his passion, effort, and hustle.

Then things shot up for Pippen. Literally.

By the beginning of his second year, Scottie grew five inches to 6-6 and seemed to be still growing. “We figured we’d bring him in as a manager and let him get his feet on the ground. He was like a young colt; he needed time to grow,” Dyer told the Washington Post back in 1987.

Scottie Pippen’s College Statistics

With the speed, athleticism and skills of a smaller guard combined with the size of college level forward, Pippen went from a common to a rare talent that could play and defend all five positions. Pippen rose from his reserve role to becoming the team’s best player in a matter of a few months. During his Sophomore year, he lead Central Arkansas in scoring and rebounding at 18.5 points and 9.2 rebounds with .564 from the field.

In his Junior year, things continued to improve as Scottie aligned his newfound stature with his abilities. Playing in 29 games that season, it came to no surprise that Pippen again led the Bears as the team leading scorer and rebounder. This year, Pippen was named to the NAIA All-American Team.

Pippen grew to 6’7 before his Senior year and was at the height of his powers. He had career highs across the board in points (23.6), rebounds (10), assists (4.3), and steals (3.1) as well as his field goal (59.2%), free throw (71.9%) and three-point (57.5%) percentages. He was a no-brainer for the NAIA All American Team.

Small Town to Big Time

Finishing his final year in college, Pippen now had a legitimate change at the NBA. The problem is that no one really paid attention to NAIA schools. Still, Pippen garnered some interest.

The only team to seriously take early interest in Pippen was the Chicago Bulls, who had the #8 pick in the upcoming NBA draft that was to be held on June 22, 1987.

In that NBA draft where David Robinson was the clear #1 pick. UNLV’s Armen Gilliam went #2 to the Phoenix Suns, Ohio State’s Dennis Hopson #3 to the New Jersey Nets, Georgetown’s Reggie Williams was chosen fourth by the Los Angeles Clippers — all expected picks. When the Seattle Supersonics turn came up, they shocked and confused basketball fans by selecting “Scott Pippen” (as David Stern announced) with the fifth overall pick.

Little did fans know that the Bulls had worked out a deal with the Sonics behind the scenes. The Sonics agreed to  choose Pippen on behalf of the Bulls. Seattle would trade Pippen to the Chicago Bulls for the rights to Olden Polynice and “other considerations” (usually that means money).

Pippen would go on to sign a $5 million dollars, 6-year contract with the Chicago Bulls teaming with Michael Jordan as one of the league’s most-devasting duos. The rest is history.

“It’s just an amazing story. He started from zero. Nobody recruited him, nobody wanted him,” Dyer said. “And now he’s a first-round draft choice. You couldn’t have written a better script.”

Actually, the sequel to that script got better. As we all know now, Pippen would team up with Jordan to win six NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls. Pippen became a perennial NBA All-Star, a member of the famed 1992 Dream Team and inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010.