Basil Hayden

Basil Hayden was born Basil Ewing Hayden on May 19, 1899, in Stanford, Kentucky, to Joseph Wallace Hayden and Ann McKinney Brown. He grew up in Paris, Kentucky, where he first played basketball in the sixth grade before attending Paris High School. After spending a year at Transylvania University, where he was a freshman baseball teammate of future Kentucky governor Happy Chandler, Hayden transferred to the University of Kentucky to study industrial chemistry. A 5-foot-11 guard-forward, he starred for the Wildcats from 1919 to 1922, becoming Kentucky’s first All-American while helping lead the program to a 28-14 record. Hayden was the driving force behind Kentucky’s 1920-21 team, which posted a 13-1 record and captured the school’s first tournament championship. He scored the game-tying basket in the Wildcats’ dramatic 20-19 victory over Georgia in the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association Tournament championship game and averaged 9.6 points per contest that season. A knee injury suffered in the high jump before his senior year limited his playing time, but he still averaged 5.0 points per game. Beyond basketball, Hayden lettered in tennis, set a Kentucky javelin record with a throw of 163 feet, 3 inches, and was a member of Kappa Sigma fraternity.

Following graduation, Hayden returned to Kentucky after a brief stint working for Dodge in Detroit. He taught and coached at Clark County High School before entering the insurance business, then was appointed Kentucky’s head basketball coach on December 14, 1926. With only one week to prepare for the season, his 1926-27 Wildcats finished 3-13, giving Hayden the distinction of being the last Kentucky coach to post a losing record until Eddie Sutton’s 1988-89 team more than six decades later. Although his coaching tenure lasted only one season, his impact on Kentucky basketball had already been firmly established through his remarkable playing career.

Hayden went on to serve in a variety of professions, including teacher, insurance salesman, tax specialist, and bank officer, spending 23 years with National Bank and Trust in Paris before retiring as treasurer of the Interboard Council of the Kentucky Conference of the Methodist Church. He also briefly coached the women’s basketball team at Kentucky Wesleyan College, where he met his first wife, Mary. In recognition of his lasting contributions to the program, the University of Kentucky retired his jersey in 1991, and in 1999 he received a standing ovation at Rupp Arena during ceremonies celebrating the opening of the UK Basketball Museum. Hayden died on January 9, 2003, at the age of 103, leaving behind a legacy as one of the true pioneers of Kentucky basketball and the Wildcats’ first All-American.