Basketball

The History of Basketball

Most sports develop over time out of games that people begin to play informally. Not so with basketball. Basketball history shows that it has the distinction of being an intentionally invented game. In 1891, James Naismith was assigned to create an indoor activity for students at the YMCA Training School in Springfield, Mass. The students, who were training to be P.E. teachers, were understandably bored doing nothing but calisthenics and gymnastics during those long New England winters. They longed for action and competition.

Dr. Naismith combined elements of outdoor games like soccer and lacrosse with the concept of a game he’d played in childhood, Duck on a Rock. To win Duck on Rock, players threw stones to hit a target placed on top of a large boulder. A ball and an elevated goal those are the simple ingredients of the sport that now has players and rabid fans in nearly every part of the world.

Naismith’s class played the first game of basket ball (two words) using a soccer ball and two peach baskets nailed to a balcony railing ten feet above the floor. The class of 18 was divided into two teams of nine players. The gym they played in was just 50 feet by 35 feet (modern courts are 94 feet x 54 feet). The final score of that first ever basketball game was 1-0. William Chase scored the lone goal from 25 feet a half-court shot in that small gym. Now that’s the kind of fact that will someday help you win a basketball history sports trivia contest.

The Sports advances to College and Professional Sports

A number of U.S. colleges adopted the game between about 1893 and 1895. In 1934 the first college games were staged in New York City's Madison Square Garden, and college basketball began to attract heightened interest. By the 1950s basketball had become a major college sport, thus paving the way for a growth of interest in professional basketball.

The first pro league, the National Basketball League, was formed in 1898 to protect players from exploitation and to promote a less rough game. This league only lasted five years before disbanding; its demise spawned a number of loosely organized leagues throughout the northeastern United States. One of the first and greatest pro teams was the Original Celtics, organized about 1915 in New York City. They played as many as 150 games a season and dominated basketball until 1936. The Harlem Globetrotters, founded in 1927, a notable exhibition team, specializes in amusing court antics and expert ball handling.

The NBA is birthed

In 1949 two subsequent professional leagues, the National Basketball League (formed in 1937) and the Basketball Association of America (1946) merged to create the National Basketball Association (NBA). The Boston Celtics, led by their center Bill Russell, dominated the NBA from the late 1950s through the 1960s. By the 1960s, pro teams from coast to coast played before crowds of many millions annually. Wilt Chamberlain, a center for the Los Angeles Lakers, was another leading player during the era, and his battles with Russell were eagerly anticipated. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, also a center, came to prominence during the 1970s. Jabbar perfected his famed "sky hook" shot while playing for the Los Angeles Lakers and dominated the opposition.

The NBA suffered a drop in popularity during the late 1970s, but was resuscitated, principally through the growing popularity of its most prominent players. Larry Bird of the Boston Celtics and Magic Johnson of the Los Angeles Lakers are credited with injecting excitement into the league in the 1980s through their superior skills and decade-long rivalry. During the late 1980s Michael Jordan of the Chicago Bulls rose to stardom and helped the Bulls dominate the NBA during the early 1990s. A new generation of basketball stars, including Shaquille O’Neal and Larry Johnson, has sustained the NBA's growth in popularity.

Article References:

• http://library.thinkquest.org
• http://www.sportsknowhow.com

The Sponsor’s Introduction:

Below you find information on joining basketball here at Fox Tech:

Schedule

Link to a MYSA article on the Fox Tech High School Basketball Team.