african-american assistant coach. he wanted to continue playing as the assistant coach, but he dropped that idea when he saw the first giant. i saw wilt chamberlin for the first time. i quit right there. i said coach, the guy isn t real. you ve got your assistant coach. the first african-american coach was bill russell who became the team s player coach in 1966. in 1971 earl lloyd became the first non-playing african-american coach in the nba with the detroit pistons. detroit s biggest star of that era, hall-of-famer dave bing who was later elected mayor of detroit said this about coach lloyd. he taught a lot of us how to play the game. but more importantly he taught us how to be good citizens how to be good ambassadors for this