Dirk Nowitzki believes NBA career could have gone better had he attended Auburn

Inside the NBA on TNT has a special guest on Saturday night, with Dirk Nowitzki filling it for Shaq. The Denver Nuggets are playing the Minnesota Timberwolves for Game 1 of the Western Conference Semifinals but in the show’s fashion, some off-topic conversation came up due to Nowitzki’s presence.

Back in the day, Charles Barkley attempted to recruit Nowitzki to play for Auburn. He told the story again on Saturday night but originally did on the Pat McAfee Show in April. Nowitzki had to enter the German Army before eventually being drafted by the Dallas Mavericks in 1998.

Nowitzki wound up winning an NBA championship in 2011 and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2023. Not many believe he could have asked for a better career but maybe if college basketball wound up being an option, some things could have gone differently.

“Don’t you think if you had went to Auburn, like I tried to talk you into, you would have been more successful?” Barkley asked.

“I think so, yeah,” Nowitzki said. “But it went well. I went straight (to the NBA) from the Army, which you didn’t believe me at the time.”

Auburn was not the only school recruiting Nowitzki at the time but he ultimately decided to enter the NBA Draft as an 18-year-old. The Tigers wound up doing just fine without Nowitzki, going 29-4 and winning the SEC regular season title. Head coach Cliff Ellis earned the program’s first-ever one-seed in the NCAA Tournament and just second-ever Sweet Sixteen.

In what was already a historic season for Auburn, it’s scary to think what they could have accomplished with a prospect like Nowitzki on the roster.

Charles Barkley tells story of recruiting Dirk Nowitzki to Auburn

When Barkley was a member of the Dream Team in 1992, he came across Nowitzki, who was playing in Germany at the time. Barkley did his best to convince Nowitzki to come to Auburn.

“I met Dirk Nowitzki and tried to pay him to come to Auburn. We played an exhibition in Germany, and I’ve got Scottie Pippen, who is a great defender, I’ve got Horace Grant. A couple of other NBA players, and we played this German team,” Charles Barkley told The Pat McAfee Show in April. “Dirk’s got like 35 at halftime. And at this time Scottie was considered a great defender. This dude finished with like 52 points.”

Barkley went up after the game and made his pitch to the then-teenager.

“I said, ‘Yo man, who are you?’ He said, ‘My name is Dirk Nowitzki.’ I said, ‘Do you wanna go to Auburn? I’ll take care of that,’” Barkley recalled. “He says, ‘I gotta go in the Army.’ I said, ‘Dude, you’re 7 feet tall. You’re not going in the damn Army.’”