Jimmy Dew

Dew graduated from Piedmont’s Bethune High School in 1954. The talent for basketball he displayed at Bethune attracted the attention of Alabama State College. Dew, variously described as 6-foot-10 to 7-feet in height, enrolled at Alabama State and almost immediately worked his way into the Hornets’ starting lineup where he remained for four seasons.    

In an early December 1954 win, Dew scored 14 points coming off the bench. A week later, he netted nine points as a starter. He had 19 points in a starting role in mid-January 1955. He led Alabama State in scoring with a game-high 21 points in its final game of his freshman season, a March 1955 loss at the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC) tournament at Tuskegee Institute.

When Alabama State defeated Tuskegee Institute 90-61 in Dew’s sophomore season, he scored 24 points. Alabama State opened a new basketball arena at the start of Dew’s junior season in November 1956. In early January 1957, the Hornets set a school single-game scoring record in a 129-50 win over Lemoyne College. Dew’s 10 points made him one of six Hornets who reached double figures in the victory.

Dew scored a game-best 25 points to lead Alabama State past Morehouse 89-62 in late January 1957 as the Hornets improved to 18-3 overall and 11-2 in SIAC play. By the close of the regular season, Alabama State was 20-3 overall and 15-3 in SIAC games, making the Hornets regular-season champions for the first time in 20 years.

As a senior, so important was Dew to the Hornets that they lost a 21-point lead and the game to Benedict College 85-81 in the first round of the SIAC tournament.   

In the April 1958 National Basketball Association draft, Dew was selected by the Detroit Pistons. He played well in a late-summer training camp for rookies but was cut when the Pistons reduced their veteran roster to 11 players. Dew also played briefly with two Eastern Basketball League teams in December 1958 – the Baltimore Bullets and the Scranton Miners.  

During the 1959-60 basketball season, Dew signed on with the Harlem Satellites, a barnstorming team. In early January 1960, he was averaging 29.7 points and the Satellites were on a 92-game winning streak.

Following a June 1961 tryout camp, Dew became the first player signed to a contract by the Pittsburgh Rens of the fledgling American Basketball League. Pittsburgh waived him the second week of September. Dew signed again with Scranton but by mid-October he had joined the barnstorming Harlem Magicians for a 245-game schedule that would extend until mid-May 1962.

Dew toured with the Magicians the next two seasons then gave up playing basketball professionally. He returned to Piedmont, where he taught and coached basketball at Bethune.