Spring 2013

Where Are They Now?

Xavier basketball is more popular now than ever, but the program has always attracted a litany of talented and touted players. Some have gone on to the professional ranks; others have simply gone on. As this year’s season gets underway, we tracked down some former players to find out what they’ve been doing in the years since they left campus. Here we check in with Hank Stein. You can find links to other profiles at the bottom of the page.

HANK STEIN '59

Whatever happened to Hank Stein? Stein was Xavier’s first All-American and the most valuable player on the 1958 glory team that clinched the University’s—and Ohio’s—first college basketball championship by sweeping the National Invitation Tournament at Madison Square Garden. He was selected in the third round of the 1959 NBA draft by the St. Louis Hawks and then disappeared. At least, so it seemed. After being cut by the Hawks before the season started, Stein hung up his Chuck Taylor hightops and went into business. He never played ball again. A native of Louisville, Ky., he married a Cincinnati girl and became an underwriter for the Cincinnati Insurance Co., retiring as a vice president after 31 years.

Though he basked in the glory of the 1958 season as 10,000 fans greeted the champions on their return home, Stein got what he needed from basketball and moved on. “I think anybody that plays sports takes the competitive nature of sports into the business world. That’s the biggest thing I got out of it—how to compete.” He and his wife Nancy had five children, one a Xavier graduate and another, Eileen, a former basketball player at the University of Dayton. Stein dutifully rooted for Eileen’s team, even against Xavier, but he’s a lifelong season ticket-holding Musketeers fan. A mild heart attack two years ago led to a 30-pound weight loss, but he still carries about 200 pounds on his 6-foot 1-inch frame, watches his diet and does laps around Cincinnati’s Sharon Woods Lake. “People ask, ‘Whatever happened to Hank Stein?’ Everyone who sees me wants to know if I still live in Louisville,” he says. “I just kept a low profile.”