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SALT LAKE CITY — Jack Stockton, the father of NBA Hall of Fame basketball player John Stockton, has died, several media outlets reported Sunday. He was 89.

KHQ Local News in Spokane, Washington said Hennessy Funeral Home will be handling the funeral arrangements.

Former Utah Jazz great John Stockton was inducted into the basketball hall of fame in 2009. His 18-year NBA career — all with the Jazz — included a league-record 15,806 assists and 3,265 steals.

But the NBA great was just a product of who raised him, he said during his induction ceremony in 2009.

“I’m here because I represent the talents and efforts and beliefs of hundreds, maybe thousands, of people that contributed," John Stockton said in his hall of fame speech. “ The top of the list is mom and dad, Jack and Cleme Stockton.”

Just a few blocks away from the Spokane campus where John Stockton made a name for himself at Gonzaga sits Jack and Dan's Tavern. On the walls of the bar and grill sat tributes to the Utah Jazz great, and evidence of a proud father whose greatest joy in his son had little to do with basketball.

“To me, the way he has handled everything in his family and our family with his notoriety …. I’m more proud of that than I am the basketball,” Jack Stockton told KSL’s Rod Zundel in 2003. “I don’t expect people to believe me, but that’s the honest truth. That’s what you look for when you are raising kids, is someone like that.”

Jack Stockton didn't have a lot of input in his son's NBA career. But there was one major decision for which John Stockton asked his father for an opinion: his retirement in 2003.

“He said, 'I’ve got to make a decision and I’m thinking about quitting.' I told him I had never told a child of mine to quit his job, and I am not going to do it now," Jack Stockton recalled at the time. "But as far as I’m concerned, you should retire and move your family back up (to Spokane) and we’ll get rolling with the rest of our lives.

“He said ‘That’s all I need to know.’”

A spokesperson for the Utah Jazz said Jack Stockton was a valued member of the extended Jazz family.

"His loss will be felt by many. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the entire Stockton family during this difficult time."

More information will be posted as it becomes available.

Our deepest condolences to the Stockton family. https://t.co/pDZXgQ0Syx — Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) May 29, 2017

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