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DeutschVin Baker did not want to return a conquering University of Hartford hero just yet. He slipped away from the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks after their day’s travel to Boston on Jan. 31, drove to West Hartford, clicked into incognito mode and took his seat quietly in Chase Arena.
“I was going to call someone and tell them I was coming down,” said Baker, who’s been an assistant with the Bucks since 2018. “But I was like, ‘No, I want to go and experience this without anyone knowing I was coming.’ I wanted to see it for myself. And the energy, the students, the fans, the alumni that were there, it was like old times. I left there, and I was so excited about the University of Hartford.”
The Hawks won a two-point thriller over Conference of New England-rival Johnson and Wales that night. The most famous, most accomplished Hawk of them all, Baker was once photographed for Sports Illustrated in that very gym, surrounded by fellow students shushing to denote what SI was calling college basketball’s “best kept secret.”
He went on to play 13 years in the NBA, score over 11,000 points, a four-time all-star. His life’s experience has included some of the lowest lows and most exhilarating of highs, but the name he made for himself at UHart will soon be emblazoned for all time on a new, $2.4 million outdoor athletics and recreation complex on the campus. And Baker is over the moon about it.
“This facility, the name on it, is going to outlive me,” Baker said. “For anyone who has been in sports, just lived life, to have such an honor that amazing, where a university feels you’ve earned that, to put your name on something like this, I’m no different than any other human being. I’m in awe. I’m super grateful. This is the most amazing thing that has ever happened to me, not only because I started at 17 years old at the University of Hartford, but I know how huge that is, to have your name on a building.”
When the complex opens next fall, it will be an unforgettable milepost in Vin Baker’s remarkable life’s journey, and the next checkpoint as UHart completes its transition from Division I to III. That controversial move, announced right after the men’s basketball team reached the NCAA Tournament in 2021, angered many alums, but it is now clear there was a plan, a method to a new form of March Madness. The school and it’s athletic program has stability and is moving in its own direction, which has so far included a new track and field facility and expanding club and intramural sports in addition to its varsity programs.
“The execution has been seamless,” Baker said. “For everyone involved with the University of Hartford since we went D-1 (in 1984), it was a transition everyone was probably uncomfortable about and wasn’t ecstatic at the time. But, quite honestly, the university is a special place, a special campus, our new president (Lawrence Ward) is a special human being, we just share the same vision, the same spirit, the same goals. I just love the direction the school is going in.”
The focus on student experience, the complex will include six tennis courts, four pickleball courts, and one basketball court, all lit for night action. The Bucks, the team that drafted Baker in 1993, are contributing to the project, including its design. Former Bucks president Peter Feigin has been driving that end of it. A lead gift was provided by alum Loic De Kertanguy, who played tennis at UHart in the late 1960s. UHart alums Anthony Assante, Mike Daglio and their Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity brothers, provided one lead gift and, with alum Kathy Behrens, have led the fundraising efforts.
“This beautful, sprawling facility,” Baker said, “it’s going to be an awesome facility, the students are going to enjoy it and I’m looking forward to coming up there and watching them enjoy this new building.”
Baker, 54, whose parents still live in Old Saybrook, where he went to the high school, does plan to be involved with UHart when his NBA career is over. As he settled into his office in Milwaukee Tuesday morning, one of his favorite players, UConn’s Andre Jackson, was working alone in the gym. Baker contemplated the life that has led him to this high point.
As his playing career was ending, Baker nearly lost everything to an addiction to alcohol. His coaching career began as he overcame it, and he has been sober for 15 years. Back in Milwaukee, he developed a father-son type of bond with superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo. An ordained minister who was at one time assistant pastor with his father, Rev. James Baker, at his Baptist Church in Saybrook, Baker officiated at Giannis’ wedding two years ago.
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“I got this amazing opportunity given to me to coach the greatest player on the planet,” Baker said, “Giannis, he’ll tell you I’m like his second Dad. We’ve just developed a relationship that I’ve never had in the NBA as a player, as a coach. “I’ve had a great experience in my nine years here in Milwaukee. Winning a championship (in 2021) with the team that drafted me, is a fairy tale story. I’ve had the opportunity to work for some terrific coaches here, Doc Rivers and Mike Budenholzer. I’ve checked every box. I believe I have more years here in the NBA, I don’t know how many more years, but I’ll tell you I would love to come back and help the University of Hartford in some capacity.”
Last November, he opened the Vin Baker Recovery Center in Milwaukee, an intensive outpatient center to help those suffering from addiction. In basketball, in life, Vin Baker has indeed checked every box, and now his name will be on an athletic complex at UHart for his children, and some day their children to see. It’s a box he never dreamed of, let alone dreamed of checking. It’s not the end of this extraordinary journey, but it will be hard to top it.
“I’m here in 2026, I’m 15 years sober and I’ve opened up a recovery center, an intense out-patient center in the city that drafted me, a city where I won a championship,” Baker said. “And to have my beloved alma mater putting my name on this. I have to pinch myself, to go through the journey I did, I’ve been through such, the highs and lows of life, and to come out on this side of it, it’s a blessing and it’s extraordinary.
“A lot of people don’t come out on this side of it, but God saw that I come out on this side and I’m forever grateful. It’s full circle. The University of Hartford and the City of Milwaukee, I don’t know a movie producer that could put this together, man.”