Former Guilford men’s basketball coach Jack Jensen experienced the rare privilege last weekend of standing on a court freshly named in his honor, and seeing newly retired jerseys of former players hoisted overhead.

The court dedication and recognition of six men’s and women’s basketball standouts – including three who played in the National Basketball Association – were among highlights of Guilford’s Basketball Legacy Weekend.

Much of Jensen’s basketball success came during Guilford’s membership in the NAIA – the Quakers won that organization’s 1973 basketball crown – but he also has made his mark in the NCAA, where he continues to coach the school’s men’s golf team, which won Division III championships in 2002 and 2005.

Last weekend, he also saw the jerseys of three of his former players – including NBA stars M.L. Carr and World B. Free, who both played on the national-championship team – hung from the ceiling of Guilford’s Ragan-Brown Field House. Another Jensen protégé, Bob Kauffman (who also played in the NBA and later was coach and general manager of the Detroit Pistons), also was honored, along with early 1960s standout Dan Kuzma and women’s team honorees Elizabeth Parker Haskins and Laura Haynes Spainhour.

Jensen won 386 games through 29 seasons as basketball coach. He earlier served as an assistant to Guilford head coach Jerry Steele, and coached Kauffman during that time.

“In his role as an assistant, he was very much a calming influence where coach Steele was an intense influence,” Kauffman, who attended with the other five former players who were honored, told the Greensboro News-Record. “They were complimentary, like ham and eggs or Astaire and Rogers. Coach Jensen was a tremendous help and tremendous complement.”

Free told the News-Record that Jensen was like an adoptive father as the Brooklyn native adjusted to the small Southern school.

“He always put me on the right road because a lot of times I wanted to veer and go left, but he kept me going right,” said the 13-year NBA veteran who now serves as the Philadelphia 76ers’ player-development coach and ambassador of basketball. “I had never seen a man with that much emotion, (but) he made me feel like he loved me, not just as a basketball player but as an individual.”

Carr, who played on two Boston Celtics championship teams and is now a member of Guilford’s board of trustees, credited Jensen for his loyalty to the school and as a role model.

About 1,850 fans attended the ceremony during men’s and women’s basketball games against Old Dominion Athletic Conference foe Randolph-Macon.

“I’m uncomfortable with it,” Jensen admitted to the Greensboro newspaper before the ceremony. “I shouldn’t be, but I am. It’s a great honor, obviously for me and for my family and for all the players that played here during those times. I’m going to have to get over it. And I’m proud of it, believe me.”