Sonic Dentist, Ex-UW Star, Dead At 66

Dr. Jack E. Nichols, the Seattle SuperSonics' team dentist and a college and NBA player in the 1940s and '50s, is dead at age 66.

Nichols, a dental surgeon who was hired by the Sonics for their first season in 1966, died Thursday of a heart attack in Palm Springs, Calif., said his wife, Jo Anne.

"We had played golf that day, been to a movie . . . he was a very active man," she said. "It was very sudden."

As a player, Nichols was known as a self-effacing master of the left-handed push shot. During the 1960s he was a leader in the campaign for the use of mouth guards for athletes in contact sports.

A 6-foot-7 1/2 graduate of Everett High School, he played center for the University of Washington in 1944, spent two years as a Marine Corps trainee at USC and returned to Washington in 1947.

In his final season, Nichols was team captain and an All-America selection with an average of 14.9 points a game and the Huskies were co-champions of the Pacific Coast Conference, forerunner of the Pacific-10 Conference.

The Associated Press once called him "the Paul Bunyan of Pacific Northwest basketball."

One of Nichols' teammates, Sammy White, went on to play catcher for 11 years in the major leagues, including nine seasons with the Boston Red Sox.

Nichols spent two years in the Marine Corps during the Korean War and played for four NBA teams, including the Boston Celtics (1954-58).

For road trips in 1956, Nichols became the roommate of rookie superstar Bill Russell. Coach Red Auerbach had a policy of rooming rookies with veterans, Nichols recalled in a 1974 interview with The Seattle Times.

"You wouldn't say we got to be bosom buddies. We were good friends," Nichols said.

Nichols used his NBA earnings to return to school and earn his doctorate in dental medicine from Tufts University in 1958.

Within three years he received the Pacific Northwest regional Man of the Year award from the Sertoma Club for promoting the use of mouth guards as required equipment for high-school and college football and basketball players.

In 1990 he served as commissioner of basketball for the Goodwill Games in Seattle.

Survivors include his wife; a son, Steve, of Kent; a daughter, Robin, of Seattle; and two granddaughters.

Memorial services are scheduled Monday at 2 p.m. at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Seattle.