Robert Smith (basketball)
Robert Leroy Smith is an American retired basketball player. A 5'11" point guard born in Los Angeles, California and from UNLV, where as a member of the fabled "Hardway Eight" coached by the legendary Jerry Tarkanian, took UNLV to its first ever NCAA Final Four. Smith played for seven NBA teams in as many seasons from 1977 to 1984.
He was selected by the Denver Nuggets in the 1977 NBA Draft in the third round.
On November 17, 1978, while playing for the Denver Nuggets, Smith scored a career-high 19 points vs the Boston Celtics.
Smith currently was coaching AAU basketball at the Bill and Lilly Heinrich YMCA in Las Vegas, NV with fellow UNLV teammate and lifelong friend, "Sudden" Sam Smith. Suffered a stroke in 2019 and is still recovering.
