Adrian Smith (basketball)

The entire 1960 USA Olympic basketball team, including Smith, was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame on August 13, 2010. Smith is also a member of the Northeast Mississippi Community College Sports Hall of Fame and the Mississippi Community College Sports Hall of Fame.

In 1971–72 he played for the American Basketball Association's Virginia Squires, averaging 5.1 points per game. He also played 13 times for the United States.

In the 1969–70 season, after 32 games with the Royals, Smith was traded to the San Francisco Warriors, for whom he played another 45 games, averaging 5.9 points per game for the season. In 1970–71, his 10th NBA season, he played only 21 games, averaging 5.3 points per game in his final NBA season.

In his sixth NBA season, 1966–67, Smith averaged 16.6 points per game and led the NBA with a .903 free throw percentage and, for the fourth time, the durable Smith led the league in games played. In 1967–68, Smith averaged 15.6 points per game in his last year as a starter. In 1968–69, playing primarily as a backup to Robertson and Tom Van Arsdale, Smith averaged 9.6 ponts per game.

After 11 seasons of playing professional basketball, Smith became a banker, working for many years as a commercial relationship manager for Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bank. He currently is a vice president for Fifth-Third Bank. He resides in Cincinnati with his wife, Paula, in the only house they've ever owned—and he still has the Ford Galaxie he won from the 1966 NBA All-Star Game.

The 1965–66 season was both his most productive and noteworthy. He averaged a career-high 18.4 points and 3.6 rebounds per game as the Royals went 45-35 and, in the Eastern Division semifinals, extended the Boston Celtics to a fifth and deciding game before falling to the eventual NBA champions. On December 15 he scored a career-high 34 points against the Celtics, and followed that up on January 5 with another career-high of 35 points. During the season, Smith was selected to the 1966 NBA All-Star Game and, surprisingly for a game that including sixteen future Hall-of-Famers, Smith was named MVP after he scored 24 points in 26 minutes. It was his only All-Star appearance, and for winning the MVP award, he received a new Ford Galaxie car.

In his fourth season of 1964–65, he became a starter in the Royals' backcourt alongside Robertson. Playing over 34 minutes per game, he averaged 15.1 points per game, with a .456 field goal percentage and .830 free throw percentage.

Smith began his professional career in the 1961–62 NBA season. During his first three seasons, he served as a backup guard behind Oscar Robertson and Bucky Bockhorn, averaging about 20 minutes per game with scoring averages of 7.2, 8.9, and 9.4, respectively.

He was selected in the 1958 NBA draft, but not until the 15th round (85th overall) by the Cincinnati Royals. Instead of attempting to make the Royals, he joined the U.S. Army, where he played on the Army's all-star team and in 1960 was selected to play on the eventual undefeated U.S. men's basketball team that won the gold medal in the 1960 Olympics in Rome, Italy. The team went 8-0 in the Olympics, led by future hall-of-famers Oscar Robertson, Jerry Lucas, and Jerry West, although in the opening win against host Italy, Smith was the team's leading scorer, with 17 points scored. The team's average margin of victory in the eight games was 42.4 points per game.

Smith didn't see much action his junior season until Kentucky's star guard, Vernon Hatton, went out with an appendectomy, and for seven games, Smith averaged 16.3 points. As a senior, Smith was a starter and averaged 12.4 points per game. The Wildcats' team, known as the "Fiddlin' Five", beat Seattle University 84-72 to win the 1957–58 national championship, led by 30 points from Hatton and 24 from Johnny Cox. Smith averaged just under 14 points in UK's four NCAA tourney wins, including seven in the championship game.

Adrian Howard "Odie" Smith (born October 5, 1936) is an American former professional basketball player.