(Photo) Cecil Mosenson who coached Wilt Chamberlain at Overbrook was himself an Overbrook High School player.  He is in this photo taken from the book.

this review by Dave Burman, the Lewistown sportscaster

The view from here is that Wilt Chamberlain was the greatest basketball player ever.  I often saw him play in person when he was a member of the Philadelphia Warriors and on television later in his pro career, and I've seen film of him playing at the U. of Kansas.  But, before I watched this DVD, I had never seen any footage of Wilt playing at Overbrook, the high school that he attended in Philadelphia.

The DVD is appropriately titled The Greatest Player Ever, and it is a documentary about Chamberlain's athletic career.  It begins with film from the 1954 Philadelphia City Championship game, in which Overbrook defeated West Catholic.  No American athlete in the 20th century had a greater impact on the rules of his sport than Wilt Chamberlain had on basketball, and the Overbrook vs. West Catholic film illustrates why fundamental changes to the rules of basketball were adopted specifically because of Wilt.  The film shows Wilt swatting away shot after shot in a fashion that would now be whistled as goaltending.  Wilt was so dominant that the goaltending rule was instituted to prevent what he was doing on defense.  The 1954 Philadelphia title game was played at The Palestra, and one thing that is immediately evident in watching the DVD is that the foul lanes were much narrower then than they are now.  The widening of the lane occurred because of Wilt's dominance inside.  Amazingly, the DVD includes some film of an Overbrook practice!  I believe that all of this Overbrook material was taken from an archive of the weekly sports anthology show Telesports Digest, which was similar to the current ESPN Sports Center, only it was syndicated to various television stations and was telecast weekly, rather than nightly.  The show was produced in Philadelphia by a company called Tel-Ra, now long-defunct.

Chamberlain was a great all-around athlete, and the DVD shows him high jumping.  Wilt was a high school high jump champion.  Another segment in the DVD , taken from some long ago television show, has Wilt challenging Muhammad Ali to box him for the world heavyweight title.  Ali is totally evasive, and Wilt, who was very bright, continually put the champ on the spot.  Chamberlain got much the better of the repartee with Ali.  There's a clip of Wilt playing volleyball, and I seem to remember that he was a pro volleyball player for awhile.

There are some interview segments on the DVD of various people talking about Wilt, particularly two of his former Overbrook teammates, Vince Miller and Jimmy Sadler, and his coach at Overbrook, Cecil Mosenson.  One of the most interesting topics discussed is how Wilt was recruited to Kansas.  I've often wondered what it took to get Wilt out there.

There is more about Wilt's recruitment in the book by coach Mosenson, It All Began with Wilt, which was published in 2008.  Cecil Mosenson was a recent Temple U. graduate when he was hired to be the head coach at Overbrook, his alma mater.  Mosenson had been a starter on a strong Overbrook team, had played at Temple, and also had played pro ball in the Eastern League prior to taking the helm at Overbrook and inheriting a team on which Wilt was a junior.  Mosenson had actually played against Chamberlain over the years in various games around Philadelphia, and how the coach interacted with his star player is a mighty interesting part of the book.  At one point, Mosenson briefly threw Chamberlain off the team.  Of course, they made up, and the team lost only once--to Farrell--in Chamberlain's last two high school seasons.

Mosenson coached for three years at Overbrook, then left coaching for a while to assist in his family's struggling delicatessen in Chester.  He returned to coaching at Upper Moreland (Willow Grove, PA) for 15 years, then was a junior high school principal, followed by a decade coaching hoops at William Tennent (Warminster, PA).  Later, he coached the Archbishop Carroll (Radnor, PA) freshman girls team.  A first person autobiography, the book covers all of that ground, but it really is a book about leadership, as much of the discussion is how Mosenson addressed various tricky situations as coach or administrator, and how upper level administrators dealt with--or tried to avoid confronting--problems.  It's a concise book, and I recommend it without reservation to high school coaches, to fans of Wilt Chamberlain, and to people interested in Philadelphia high school basketball history.  For me, the book's most memorable line is: "The aura of coaching Wilt followed me all through my life."  That was qute an aura. 

The best way to find how how to get the DVD and/or the book is to write to coach Mosenson directly at coachmos@aol.com . 

DVD with Film of Wilt Chamberlain Playing in High School & Book by Wilt's Coach at Overbrook

Editor's Note:  I talked with Coach Mosenson on the telephone on Monday May 16, 2011.  He told me he was only 22 when he coached the team in 1954. He is 81 today.   He called me to see if I could help him find a copy of the film of the 1954 game played out in Farrell where Overbrook lost their only game in Wilt's last two years in high school.  And our website has the box score of the game.  We feature excerpts from the Sharon Herald sportswriter Johnny Pepe who covered the game in 1954.

Farrell 59   Philadelphia Overbrook  58, Farrell Lions Club Tournament
"Chamberlains phenomenal antics not only provided the crowd with one of the best basketball shows they had ever seen, but won him the Lions Club Trophy for being the most valuable player."  (Sharon Herald, Dec 29, 1954)
This photo  from the game shows Wilt Chamberlain, near the rim,  when he played at Farrell High School on Dec. 28, 1954, and his team was handed its only loss of his senior year by Farrell High School.
(Photo credit: Jim Raykie, The Sharon Herald)  This photo comes from the game.

Farrell-Overbrook 1954 box score  HERE