Basketball Hall of Fame postpones induction ceremony until 2021

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Tamika Catchings will have to wait until 2021 to be enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Basketball Hall of Fame chairman Jerry Colangelo told ESPN that the enshrinement ceremony for Catchings, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan and four others will be delayed until 2021 because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The ceremony was to have taken place in Springfield on Aug. 29. Colangelo told ESPN that the event will be moved until the spring of 2021.

Colangelo did not respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. There was no immediate announcement from the Hall of Fame about the rescheduling plan.

“We’re definitely canceling,” Colangelo told ESPN. “It’s going to have to be the first quarter of next year. We’ll meet in a couple of weeks and look at the options of how and when and where.”

Catchings, a WNBA great for the Indiana Fever, got into the Hall in her first year as a finalist, as did Bryant, Garnett and Duncan. The other members of the Class of 2020 were two-time NBA champion coach Rudy Tomjanovich, longtime Baylor women’s coach Kim Mulkey, 1,000-game winner Barbara Stevens of Bentley and three-time Final Four coach Eddie Sutton — who died this past weekend.