This is a list of all notable basketball players who died while on a team roster, as a free agent, or while not rostered, but still seeking work, playing for a national team, or otherwise not retired.
Some suffered sudden cardiac death, which has a higher incidence in basketball among young athletes.
[1][2] Some suffered from the heart condition hypertrophic cardiomyopathy,[3] which is more common in African Americans.
Fourteen members of the 1977–78 Evansville Purple Aces men's basketball team died in a plane crash on December 13, 1977, along with fifteen others including head coach Bobby Watson.
The players killed were: Freshman David Furr, the lone member of the team who did not board Air Indiana Flight 216, died two weeks later in a car crash, meaning all the members of the team died during the 1977–78 season.