Back in his college days Joe Dumars passed the time on long road trips talking through the night with the bus driver.

Passing on sleep or messing around in the back, Dumars stayed awake, Bible in hand, telling and hearing stories.

“I remember those long trips and talking to the driver,” said Dumars. “It’s the relationships I made while at McNeese that I remember most.”

Tonight, Dumars’ long journey back to McNeese State comes full circle.

The university will honor its greatest basketball player in a ceremony naming the floor inside the Legacy Center in his name.

Joe Dumars Court will become the official playing surface of the McNeese basketball teams between tonight’s men’s and women’s games against Northwestern State.

“It is a great honor,” Dumars said. “I am super happy to have a court named after me. This is special.

“I have gotten awards, but some have more to do with a legacy like this. They mean more to you.”

Dumars, who played on 1994’s Dream Team II, said this honor goes right up there with his NBA Sportsmanship Award won in 1996 and making the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

The former Detroit shooting guard won two NBA championships and was a six-time All-Star while with the Pistons. He was voted the Finals MVP in 1990, clinching Game 5 and the title on the day his father died.

But he became a star at McNeese when fans flocked to the Civic Center in downtown Lake Charles to watch him battle Lamar and Southwestern Louisiana, now Louisiana-Lafayette.

“It was a packed house every night,” said Ron Hayes, the longtime McNeese radio broadcaster who called those games.

“People literally fought to get a seat. I remember one time when they were playing Karl Malone and Louisiana Tech, two guys got into a fight in the aisle going for the last seat in a row.

“There was that much interest. People were standing everywhere to watch.”

Dumars played for McNeese from 1981-85, averaging 22.5 points a game and finishing as the 11th leading scorer in NCAA history.

In his senior year Dumars averaged 25.8 points and was named the Southland Conference Player of the Year before being selected in the first round by Detroit. His No. 4 was retired both by McNeese and the Pistons.

However, it is his time in Lake Charles, when he developed his game and met his wife, that Dumars loves to talk about.

“My four years at McNeese were great,” he said. “I have so many special relationships and friends that I still am in contact with.

“I only played at the Civic Center. It was a special time. We had great crowds and great rivalries.”

He brought attention to McNeese as well, putting the basketball program in the national spotlight.

“Big names came to watch Joe play,” Hayes said. “I remember looking down on the floor and seeing Jerry West and Elgin Baylor and other big basketball names coming to see him play. That was special.”

Dumars also left his mark on how he worked.

“I remember he would go to the gym on campus on Sunday nights just to get in shots,” Hayes said. “He did it so much I think the coaches gave him his own key.

“Most impressively, he stayed so humble and never changed. He’s the same guy every time you see or talk to him no matter what he accomplishes.”

Currently an executive in the NBA, Dumars hasn’t always been close to the McNeese program. That changed when current athletic director and former head coach Heath Schroyer reached out to him.

“Joe is a very important part of the McNeese basketball history and we have become friends,” Schroyer said. “I think it is great that we can do this and honor somebody who has meant so much to so many people in the area.

“This is a special night for a special person.”

For Dumars, who says his favorite moment at McNeese was when as a freshman he helped the Cowboys upset Lamar, the timing for this honor is right.

“Anytime something like this happens to you it is great, but the fact that it is happening now, at this time of my career, is really special,” the 59-year-old Dumars said.

As for his legacy at McNeese, it will now be written in plain site.

After tonight Dumars will no longer just have numbers in the McNeese record book, or a jersey hanging alongside a few others up in the rafters.

His name will be front and center on the court for every person who watches a Cowboys home game, linking him to the program he made famous.

“Having a guy like Joe Dumars associated with our program is great,” said McNeese head coach John Aiken. “People who come here for years to come will wee what you can do from a place like this.”

That makes for a pretty good story for the next generation of Cowboys for long bus rides to games.