BATON ROUGE, La. -- Former All-SEC basketball star Georgie Nattin Jr., a member of the first LSU team to defeat Kentucky in hoops, died Monday in Benton, Louisiana, at the age of 74.
Nattin played for the Tigers from 1959-62, earning first-team All-SEC honors in '61 and third-team honors in '62 as chosen by The Associated Press. He was also named Academic All-SEC in 1962.
LSU had lost to Kentucky and legendary coach Adolph Rupp in every meeting since 1933, including a Southeastern Conference championship playoff game in 1954. The streak had reached 19 games when the Tigers, under coach Jay McCreary, met on Jan. 13, 1961, at the “Cow Palace” in Baton Rouge. That night, LSU was at its best and Nattin helped the Tigers to a 73-59 decision against the Wildcats.
Nattin scored 12 points in the win, hitting three field goals and all six of his free-throw attempts.
It would be 11 more years before LSU would win again against Kentucky, two seasons after Pete Maravich had moved to the NBA, in 1972.
Nattin was born in Houston in 1940 but grew up in Bossier City, Louisiana. At LSU, Nattin led the team all three years in scoring, averaging 13.5 points per game in 1960, 16.5 in '61 and 12.8 in '62. He also led the team in field goals made twice (165 in 1961 and 122 in '62), free throws made in 1962 (62), field-goal percentage in 1961 (41.8 percent) and in free-throw percentage in 1961 (79.5) and '62 (78.4).
Nattin fell just short of the 1,000-point club with 937 career points. His career free-throw percentage of 79.2 ranks eighth on LSU’s all-time list.
Nattin was an easy choice for the 1960s All-Decade team that was chosen in 2008-09 as part of the 100 years celebration of LSU basketball and was on the final ballot for the All-Century team that was selected.
