Northwestern forward Aaron Liberman played 1 minute Sunday in a 74-51 loss at Michigan and didn’t record a single statistic, but he still made a bit of Big Ten Conference history.
Liberman, a 6-foot-10 freshman walk-on from Valley Torah High School in Los Angeles became the first player in Big Ten history to wear a yarmulke in a game. A yarmulke is a skullcap worn by Orthodox Jews and by other Jewish men during prayer.
Liberman is believed to be the only Orthodox Jew playing major college basketball, but he is not the first player to wear a yarmulke in a Division I game. The other player to do so was former Towson guard Tamir Goodman, who played in 2000 and 2001 and was nicknamed the “Jewish Jordan.”
Liberman was invited to speak after a home game last month about what it’s like for him to be an Orthodox Jew playing major college hoops. The school handed approximately 200 purple yarmulkes with an N printed on them to people who attended.
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6 Responses
YWN only printed 4 out of the 5 paragraphs in the original story.
What is this MSNBC?
with all the depressing news lately , this is one great story.
KOl Hakavod,
not surprising that a graduate of Rav Stulberger would be the first to show his Jewish Pride.
According to a variety of sources, he holds (unlike Tamir Goodman) that he is allowed to play on Shabbos as long as he doesn’t do any melachas (so presumably he walks to the arena, has a teammate operate any electronic devices needed to enter the locker room and does not take a warm shower after the game – and as a “walk on” he isn’t getting paid to play basketball).
As most frum communities discourage boys above Bar Mitzvah from play ball games such as basketball and baseball on Shabbos, I’m not sure we should be glorifying him.
And it is ironic in one way, as Northwestern was one of the last universities to abolish its Jewish quotas.
Locky player your in USA,
in Israel never would they allow you to play with a Yarmulke
stop with the “variety of sources” nonesense. and, since he isnt from, most frum communities, likely not yours, stop holding him to your standard.