Leroy Patrick Chollet (March 5, 1925 – June 10, 1998) was an American professional basketball player who led the then-segregated Loyola University (which admitted only white students until the 1950s and was later renamed Loyola University New Orleans) to its first national championship. After his African American heritage was revealed, Chollet moved from New Orleans to New York and played three seasons for Canisius College. In New York, he passed as white; Canisius would later claim Chollet to be the school's first African American basketball player.
He played for several professional teams, including the Syracuse Nationals. During the inaugural season of the National Basketball Association (NBA), Chollet became a role player behind established veterans, and the team made it to the 1950 NBA Finals. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame at Holy Cross School, and at Loyola and Canisius.
Early life and high school
Leroy Chollet was born to Olga and Alfred Chollet on March 5, 1925. His paternal great-grandmother was black, making Chollet and his siblings one-eighth black. By the standards of the time, this meant that Leroy Chollet and his family were subject to racial segregation laws in the South. The family moved from New Roads to New Orleans, where they passed as white. The Chollet brothers—Leroy, Al, and Hillary—all attended Holy Cross School, which refused admission to black students. The brothers excelled at sports, and Leroy led the basketball team to consecutive state titles.
College career
Chollet served eleven months in the U.S. Navy before being discharged and moving on to college. He attended Loyola University in New Orleans from 1944 to 1945 as a student athlete, during a season that played out against the backdrop of World War II. Loyola alumni followed the team from overseas, writing battlefield letters back to the current players, and the school held Mass in memory of former students who were killed in action. The team faced traditional Dixie Conference opponents and armed forces teams from across the Southern United States.
During his freshman year, Chollet led the Loyola Wolf Pack to Louisiana's first national basketball championship. After a quiet start, he became the team's leading scorer. In the low-scoring semifinals of the 1945 NAIA basketball tournament, Loyola fell behind 30–21 before Chollet and team captain John Casteix led the Wolf Pack on a late-game scoring run; they beat Southern Illinois by a single basket. In their final game, Loyola defeated Pepperdine University, with Chollet scoring a game-high 18 points.
His younger brother, Hillary Chollet, had become a high school football star, recruited by rival colleges Louisiana State University (LSU) and Tulane. After Hillary chose Tulane, the family's genealogy came under increased scrutiny. Louisiana colleges were segregated, and neither Tulane nor Loyola accepted black students at the time. Chollet's Wolf Pack teammates wanted him to stay at Loyola but could not influence the unfolding events. Amidst public rumors of their African American ancestry, the Chollet parents endured harassment, the family was ostracized socially, and both brothers were pushed out of New Orleans' white universities. Hillary went out of state to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and Leroy transferred to Canisius College, a private Jesuit college in Buffalo, New York. Their older brother Al and their parents followed them to New York after an experience the family described as "being run out of town".
Chollet played three seasons for Canisius and became their first player to total 1,000 points. While Chollet was on the team, Louisiana State University traveled to New York twice to play against Canisius and lost both times. In the final game of his senior season, Chollet scored 14 points to push his school record to 1,116 total points.
In New York, the Chollet family again passed as white. Louisiana newspapers did not openly publish their ancestry, and the family was not a part of the local black community. Canisius later claimed Leroy Chollet as their first African American basketball player. Chollet was inducted into the Canisius Hall of Fame in 1964, and the Loyola Athletic Hall of Fame in 1993.