Thomas Joseph Gola was born on January 13, 1933 and grew up in Philadelphia’s Olney neighborhood. He was a stand-out basketball player at La Salle College High School, where he helped lead the team to a Philadelphia Catholic League Championship. Upon graduation in 1951, Gola fielded many scholarship offers but decided to attend La Salle College as a business major.

In his freshman year, Gola helped lead the basketball team to the 1952 NIT Championship and was named tournament MVP. The team won the 1954 NCAA basketball championship and lost the championship game in 1955. Gola’s career total of 2,201 rebounds in four years is a still a NCAA record. After graduation, Gola played 11 seasons in the NBA with the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors and the New York Knicks. When the Warriors won the 1956 NBA championship, Gola became, at the time, one of only two men in history to have won NIT, NCAA, and NBA titles. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame and became a charter member of both La Salle’s Hall of Athletes and the Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame. In 1968, Gola returned to La Salle and coached the basketball team for two seasons, ending his first season with a 23-1 record.

Gola married Caroline Ann Norris in 1955, and they had one son, Thomas Christopher.

Gola’s political career began with his election to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1966; he was re-elected two years later. The next year he was elected as the City Controller of Philadelphia, but lost a re-election bid for this post in 1973. Gola also made an attempt at the Philadelphia mayor’s office in 1983, but lost in the Republican primary.

In 1998, La Salle named its new basketball court, within the renovated Hayman Center, the Tom Gola Arena. A few years later, Gola sustained a serious injury from an accidental fall. Complications stemming from that collapse caused his death on January 26, 2014, at the age of 81. One year later, La Salle paid yet another tribute to him when a statue of his likeness was unveiled and dedicated in Hayman Center.