EPISODE 239: The Minneapolis Lakers & the NBA's First Dynasty - With Marcus Thompson

The NBA's 75th anniversary season is well underway, and we take a reverential look this week at some of the league's most legendary dynasties, starting with its very first - the Minneapolis Lakers of the late 1940s/early 1950s - with sportswriter Marcus Thompson ("Dynasties: The 10 G.O.A.T Teams That Changed the NBA Forever").

While the Los Angeles version of the Lakers has been pumping out iconic clusters of championships since 1971 (including the Magic Johnson-led "Showtime"-era in the 1980s, and the Shaq/Kobe-powered bookends during the 2000s) - it was the team's genesis in Minnesota's Twin Cities during the league's fledgling first years that set the template for modern-day pro hoops greatness.

In fact, Minneapolis' Lakers franchise was dominating the game even before joining the NBA's inaugural season in 1949-50 as the champions of both of the circuit's predecessors - the penultimate season of the National Basketball League (1947-48) and the last season of the Basketball Association of America (1948-49).

Led by pro basketball's first true national superstar George Mikan, the Lakers piled up six championship trophies across three leagues between 1948-54 - including four out of the NBA's first five titles.

Dynasties: The 10 G.O.A.T Teams That Changed the NBA Forever - buy book here

EPISODE 171: Pittsburgh's Pro Hoops History – With Stephen J. Nesbitt

Pittsburgh-based The Athletic sportswriter Stephen J. Nesbitt (“How the Pipers, Condors and Pro Basketball in Pittsburgh Went Extinct”) joins to help us dig into the surprisingly rich (though mostly woeful) history of professional hoops in the Steel City.

Though the game has long thrived at the collegiate level (Pitt’s Panthers began playing in 1905; the Duquesne Dukes in 1914), the city’s record of success at the pro level has been distinctly more fleeting.  In fact, some would argue it was never better than the pre-integration Black Fives era of the 1910s/20s, when eventual Naismith Hall of Famer Cumberland Posey led his Monticello (1912) and Loendi Big Five (1919-23) clubs to five “Colored” Basketball World Championships.

As professional (and eventually integrated) leagues took root in the decades that followed, Pittsburgh’s attractive demographic profile made it a natural choice for inaugural – yet ultimately short-lived – franchises in virtually every major hardwood circuit that came calling, including:

• The never-playoff-qualifying Pirates (1937-39) and re-born Raiders (1944-45) of the NBA-precedent National Basketball League;

• The lamentable Ironmen (1947-48) of the NBA tributary Basketball Association of America;

• The Connie Hawkins-led Renaissance (“Rens”) of the one-and-a-half-season (1961-62) American Basketball League; and especially;

• The head-scratching Pipers of the legendary American Basketball Association – who, despite winning the league’s first championship behind regular-season and playoff MVP Hawkins in 1968 – relocated to Minneapolis, moved back to Pittsburgh, and finally re-branded as the “Condors” for two forgettable last seasons (1970-72).

With a checkered pro history like that, it’s little wonder that the basketball team most memorably associated with the City of Bridges wasn’t even a real club – the Pittsburgh Pisces (née Pythons) of the 1979 sports/disco fantasy cult film classic The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh.

               

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh - rent via Amazon Prime here

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh - buy DVD here

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh - buy soundtrack here

The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh - buy book here

EPISODE #41: ABA Basketball’s Indiana Pacers with Sportswriter Mark Montieth

Long-time Indianapolis pro hoops beat reporter Mark Montieth (Reborn: The Pacers and the Return of Pro Basketball to Indianapolis) joins host Tim Hanlon to delve into the intriguing story behind the efforts of late-1960s civic leaders to re-establish a top-tier professional franchise in the capital city of basketball-mad Indiana after a curious 14-year absence.   

One of eleven charter franchises in 1967’s upstart American Basketball Association, the Indiana Pacers literally and figuratively “set the pace” early and often during the league’s nine-year existence – amassing three ABA championships, five finals appearances, and a dazzling array of All-Star talent including the likes of Freddie Lewis, Bob Netolicky, Billy Knight, and future Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees Roger Brown, Mel Daniels, George McGinnis, and head coach Bobby “Slick” Leonard.

In a league synonymous with wild games, outsized personalities and vagabond franchises, the Pacers were a uniquely steady constant on the court, in the stands and with the local Indianapolis community – which later rewarded them with a downtown-transforming arena of their own in 1974, and ultimately, helped bolster their case to become one of only four ABA clubs to be included in the post-merger National Basketball Association in 1976.

Our thanks to SportsHistoryCollectibles.com , Audible and Podfly for their sponsorship of this week’s episode!

Reborn: The Pacers and the Return of Pro Basketball to Indianapolis - buy book here

EPISODE #34: The National Basketball League with Author Murry Nelson

Basketball historian and Penn State professor emeritus Murry Nelson (The National Basketball League: A History) returns to the podcast – this time to dive into the deep end of one of the modern-day NBA’s  most important formative tributaries. 

The National Basketball League was forged out of an industrial collective of independent “company teams” that dotted the Midwest in the mid-1930s – and through the corporate patronage of firms like Goodyear, Firestone and General Electric, became a full-time pro hoops circuit that eventually stretched from Syracuse to Denver – with a hefty dollop of smaller markets in between.   Teams like the Oshkosh (WI) All-Stars, Anderson (IN) Duffy Packers, Tri-Cities (IA)  Blackhawks, and Toledo (OH)-based Jim White Chevrolets – along with star players like the lane-dominating Leroy “Cowboy” Edwards, long-range shooting ace Bobby McDermott, and the pro game’s first true “big man” George Mikan – broke new ground,  and spawned the launch of an even bigger-market competitor (the Basketball Association of America, in 1946) that ultimately resulted in a 1949 merger that yielded what we now know as the National Basketball Association.

Today’s Detroit Pistons, Sacramento Kings, Los Angeles Lakers, Atlanta Hawks, and Philadelphia 76ers all emanated directly from the NBL – although you might not know it, given the NBA’s tilted version of basketball history, as Nelson tells host Tim Hanlon in this enlightening episode.

Out thanks to Podfly and Audible for their support of the show! 

The National Basketball League: A History, 1935-1949 - buy book here