Glen Rice’s place among college basketball’s greats is getting another layer of recognition.
The Michigan icon was named Monday, July 13, to the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame class of 2026, joining five other inductees: former Villanova coach Jay Wright, former Tulsa, Georgia and Kentucky coach Tubby Smith, former Kansas coach Ted Owens, former BYU star Danny Ainge and the late former UCLA guard Walt Hazzard.
The induction ceremony is set for Oct. 22, 2026, at the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame inside the College Basketball Experience in Kansas City, Missouri.
For Michigan, Rice’s selection adds another familiar name to the Hall. He becomes the third former Wolverine honored there, alongside former forward Cazzie Russell and former coach John Beilein.
"Every player who comes through Michigan knows who Glen Rice is and what he means to this program," U-M basketball head coach Mike Boynton Jr. said in a statement. "He helped deliver our first national championship, set a standard of excellence that still defines Michigan Basketball and built a legacy that has stood the test of time.
"This honor is incredibly well deserved, and we're excited to celebrate Glen and everything he has meant to our program."
Rice’s résumé already had plenty of gold on it. He was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame in 2007 and the University of Michigan Hall of Honor in 2010. Now, he adds a national Hall of Fame nod to a career that still looms large in Ann Arbor.
From 1986-89, Rice was one of the best players in U-M history. He capped his Michigan run by leading the Wolverines to their first national championship, earning Most Outstanding Player honors at the Final Four after averaging 30.7 points in the NCAA Tournament.
That title run remains part of college basketball lore for another reason, too: Rice’s 184 points and 75 made field goals during the tournament are still NCAA records for a single tournament.
His numbers at Michigan were staggering across the board. Rice finished second on the program’s all-time scoring list with 2,442 points and still owns the school record for made field goals with 949. He led the Big Ten in scoring as both a junior and senior, and in his final season he was named Big Ten Player of the Year after averaging 27.7 points per game.
Rice’s success didn’t stop in college. The Flint, Michigan, native was taken No. 4 overall by the Miami Heat in the 1989 NBA Draft and went on to play 15 seasons in the league. He won an NBA title with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2000, made three All-Star teams and was named All-Star Game MVP in 1997, a year in which he also earned second-team All-NBA honors.
Michigan retired his No. 41 jersey at Crisler Center in 2005, another permanent marker of a career that now has one more major honor attached to it.
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