Dick Van Arsdale, a three-time All-Star who, with his brother, Tom, were the first set of identical twins to play in the N.B.A. after starring and confusing opponents and teammates alike in high school and at Indiana University, died on Monday at his home in Phoenix. He was 81.
Tom Van Arsdale said the cause was heart and kidney failure.
While the Van Arsdales had remarkably similar statistical careers, Dick was considered the slightly better player, if only by the measure of superior pro teams. He played for the New York Knicks and the Phoenix Suns during 12 N.B.A. seasons, making the playoffs four times, while Tom suited up for five teams, none of which made the playoffs during the same span.
Blonde and blue-eyed, the Van Arsdale twins were the stereotypical picture of their rural Indiana roots, but on the basketball court neither was a precise positional fit at 6 feet 5 inches: not fast enough for the backcourt, not big enough for the frontcourt.
Dick, who began his pro career as a forward and switched to guard, was nonetheless a rugged defender while averaging a career 16.4 points per game, exceeding 20 three times during his years in Phoenix.
Van Arsdale had played three seasons with the Knicks when, in 1968, he joined the newly formed Suns, an expansion team whose general manager, Jerry Colangelo, had selected him first. Van Arsdale scored the franchise’s first points and became an organization fixture, known as the original Sun. He served as interim coach during the 1986-87 season, then as a front-office executive and later a television analyst.
“We couldn’t find a better player on or off the floor to build our team,” Colangelo told The Arizona Republic in 1970. “If I could field five Vans, what I’d lack in height and rebounding, I’d offset with fight and desire.”
The performative similarities in the Van Arsdales was as striking as their appearance. After their senior high school seasons, they shared the title of Mr. Indiana Basketball, an honor presented annually by The Indianapolis Star recognizing the top high school basketball player in the state.
Both were recruited by Indiana University, where Dick averaged 17.2 points and 10 rebounds per game to Tom’s 17.4 and 10. They were drafted into the N.B.A. one selection apart — Dick as the 13th pick, Tom as the 14th. They each played in three N.B.A. All-Star games.
“We have always gone to the same schools, taken the same courses, got about the same grades,” Dick told Newsday in 1966. “We have always had each other to talk to and fight with. We feel we have been lucky because we have been so close. I know that isn’t true with other twins, possibly because they aren’t as equal as we are.”
Their intense sibling rivalry dated to childhood one-on-one games at the family home, though they loathed guarding each other in the N.B.A. Out of uniform, rare was the player or coach who could tell them apart. They weren’t above playful identity swaps, though Tom resisted Dick’s scheme to exchange uniforms in one of two N.B.A. All-Star games in which they were on competing sides.
In 1978, they spoofed their identical looks in a TV commercial for Miller Lite beer.
Unlike his brother, Dick experienced the playoffs in 1967 and 1968 with the Knicks, in 1970 with the Suns and again in 1976 when the Suns lost to the Boston Celtics in the N.B.A. finals. Van Arsdale averaged 6.6 points in 28.5 minutes off the bench in a six-game series.
Tom, hoping to finally play postseason ball, reunited with Dick in Phoenix the following season, but injuries to key players ruined the team’s chances. The brothers, at 34, retired together.
Several sets of identical twins followed them into the N.B.A., including the Morris brothers, Markieff and Marcus. In 2013, Marcus joined his brother with the Suns. Markieff is now with the Dallas Mavericks.
Richard Albert Van Arsdale was born on Feb. 22, 1943, in Indianapolis, 15 minutes after his brother, both premature, causing concern for their survival.
The Van Arsdales lived in Greenwood, a municipality 11 miles south of Indianapolis that was cited in 1965 by the Indiana Civil Rights Commission as a sundown town, where nonwhites were not allowed after dark.
Raymond Van Arsdale, the twins’ father, taught math and coached track at Emmerich Manual High School in Indianapolis. Their mother, Hilda (Thomas) Van Arsdale, worked in the school office. The family’s decision to have the twins attend and play against stiffer competition at Manual, where they lost in the state title game in 1961, caused some resentment in Greenwood.
Dick married Barbara Fenton in 1965. In addition to his brother, he is survived by his wife; a son, Jason; a daughter, Jill Van Arsdale; and four grandchildren.
In 2005, Dick suffered a stroke that caused speech impairment. His hand movement unaffected, he took up ink and pencil drawing. “If I didn’t have art right now, I’d have problems,” he told Phoenix magazine in 2013.
He also had his brother, who simultaneously began oil painting. In 2018, the brothers opened an art studio and store in the Old Town section of Scottsdale, Ariz. “He got into it when I did,” Dick told the magazine. He held up two joined fingers and said, “We’re like this.”
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