Hazzard, who suffered a stroke in 1996, died at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center following a long illness, the university announced. Hazzard had endured complications following heart surgery, his family said.
The backbone of UCLA's undefeated 1964 championship team, Hazzard directed the Bruins' offense to a 98-83 victory over Duke in the NCAA final. But he was unable to bring another NCAA title banner to Pauley Pavilion as the Bruins' coach from 1984 to 1988. He was a special consultant with the Lakers at the time of his death.
PHOTOS: Walt Hazzard | 1942-2011
"Walt was the catalyst for Coach John Wooden's first championship team and played the game with a style that excited Bruin basketball fans everywhere," Dan Guerrero, UCLA's athletic director, said in a statement.
Hazzard, who played 10 seasons in the NBA, including three for the Lakers, was a scout for the L.A. team until suffering the stroke. He had open-heart surgery soon after and was in rehabilitation for years.
UCLA basketball coach Ben Howland called Hazzard "one of the pillars of UCLA's first championship team in men's basketball."
"He was a great player and an outstanding coach at UCLA," Howland said in a statement. "He is a huge part of the UCLA legacy."
Walter Raphael Hazzard Jr. was born April 15, 1942, in Wilmington, Del., and grew up in Philadelphia. As an 8-year old he went to a performance by the Harlem Globetrotters and later said, "I went out and practiced dribbling like Marques Haynes for hours every day."
Hazzard was soon absorbed into Philadelphia's basketball high society, honing his game as an Overbrook High School sophomore on the playground "against Guy Rodgers, Wilt Chamberlain, Woody Sauldsberry and Andy Johnson," he later said.
Like Chamberlain, Hazzard became a star at Overbrook, where his teams were 89-3. He was the city player of the year as a senior.
UCLA provided a grander stage, and the 6-foot-2 point guard helped the Bruins to their first Final Four appearance in 1962.
Hazzard's skills as a ball handler were such that Wooden once said, "I never had a better man on the fast break than Walt Hazzard."
The coach later recalled that he brought Hazzard into his office one day and "asked him to pattern himself after Oscar Robertson, who looks for the pass first and the shot second. I told him his passing could make him an All-American."
A three-year starter, Hazzard did become an All-American in 1963 and again in 1964, when the Bruins went 30-0 and won the first of Wooden's 10 NCAA titles. Hazzard was named the outstanding player of the 1964 NCAA Final Four.
"Recruiting after that 1964 national championship was tremendous," Wooden said later. "Lew Alcindor [Kareem Abdul-Jabbar] would never have come to UCLA had we not won it in 1964 and 1965."
UCLA was also where Hazzard met his future wife, Jaleesa, who was a Bruin cheerleader.
Hazzard, attired in a sweater, shorts and sandals, was on campus one day with his roommate, tennis player Arthur Ashe, and said, "See that girl? I'm going to marry her."
She told him, "Not if you don't wear socks." The two were married in May 1964. By then Hazzard's future lay before him.
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