Aaron Liberman makes Big Ten history by wearing yarmulke in Northwestern’s loss
Northwestern forward Aaron Liberman played 1 minute Sunday in a 74-51 loss at Michigan and didn't record a single statistic, but he still made a bit of Big Ten Conference history.
Liberman, a 6-foot-10 freshman walk-on from Valley Torah High School in Los Angeles became the first player in Big Ten history to wear a yarmulke in a game. A yarmulke is a skullcap worn by Orthodox Jews and by other Jewish men during prayer.
Liberman is believed to be the only Orthodox Jew playing major college basketball, but he is not the first player to wear a yarmulke in a Division I game. The other player to do so was former Towson guard Tamir Goodman, who played in 2000 and 2001 and was nicknamed the “Jewish Jordan.”
Liberman observes the sabbath. Part of doing so means he doesn't use electricity from sundown Friday to sundown Saturdays. So on Fridays last season he sometimes walked 8 miles to practices.
Liberman was invited to speak after a home game last month about what it's like for him to be an Orthodox Jew playing major college hoops. The school handed approximately 200 purple yarmulkes with an N printed on them to people who attended.
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