Basketball Hall of Famer Jack Twyman's (right) efforts at seeing his former teammate Maurice Stokes inducted into the Hall of Fame will finally pay off next week. NBA Photo Library/ NBAE/ Getty Images

Jack Twyman and Maurice Stokes both grew up in Pittsburgh. They were of different races and went to different high schools, but played basketball together on the same playgrounds. Then they went their separate ways -- Twyman to the University of Cincinnati, Stokes to St. Francis College -- before being reunited when both were drafted by the Rochester Royals in 1955. They drove to training camp together.

Twyman was a fabulous shooter, but Stokes was an instant all-star. In only his second season, he led the league in rebounds and was third in assists. Red Auerbach says Stokes was Magic Johnson before there was a Magic Johnson. Then, late in his third season, after the franchise had been moved to Cincinnati, when Stokes was averaging 17 points, 18 rebounds and 6.5 assists a game, he lost his balance fighting for a rebound and when he fell, he banged his head upon the hardwood. Three days later, Stokes collapsed into Twyman's arms, falling into a coma that would last for months.

Stokes' family couldn't pay the bills; the team wouldn't. So Twyman, at the age of 24, cleverly decided that Stokes deserved workman's compensation, which he sued for and received for his friend. Then Twyman, the white man, legally adopted Stokes, his black teammate. When Stokes finally came out of his coma, Twyman or his wife Carole would come to see him most every day.

Stokes had been diagnosed with post-traumatic encephalopathy. His mind came back, but not his body. He remained a paraplegic, and it was difficult for him to communicate. When more money was needed to pay for Stokes' hospitalization, Twyman approached Milton Kutscher, who owned a resort in the Catskills. Soon a benefit summer game was started, an annual all-star exhibition that raised hundreds of thousands of dollars. The event was so successful it even prompted Wilt Chamberlain to fly back from Paris one year, just to play. Stokes never once asked for pity, just as Twyman never sought credit for his benevolence. It was just a matter of recognizing that ... there but for the grace of God....

Alas, in 1970, at the age of 36, Stokes suffered a massive heart attack and died. St. Francis honored Stokes by naming a new field house after its most famous alumnus. Outside of that little community in Western Pennsylvania, though, the world pretty much forgot about Maurice Stokes. The Cincinnati Royals moved on, to Kansas City, then to Sacramento, where they became the Kings. Twyman's basketball career ended, and in 1982 he was inducted into the basketball Hall of Fame.

But Twyman always knew Stokes was the better player, that had he not fallen ill, Stokes would have beaten him into the Hall. Every year, though, the voters would pass over Stokes. He had played only three seasons, and then back in an ancient era of train travel, set shots and smoky arenas. Fewer and fewer people remembered how he had made little St. Francis into an authentic team of consequence, how he had put up statistics in the NBA that placed him in the company of Bill Russell and Bob Pettit and Bob Cousy -- the best of their day. So Twyman kept nominating his old teammate, trying to keep his memory alive.

And finally ... next week, 34 years after his death, 46 years after he last laced up his sneakers, in Springfield, Mass., Maurice Stokes will be inducted into the Naismith International Basketball Hall of Fame. Jack Twyman, his brother's keeper, will accept the honor in his old friend's behalf.

Sports Illustrated senior contributing writer Frank Deford is a regular contributor to SI.com and appears each Wednesday on National Public Radio's Morning Edition. He is a longtime correspondent for HBO's Real Sports and his new novel, An American Summer (Sourcebooks Trade), is available at bookstores everywhere.