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History

NBA · FOUNDED 1946

The NBA began in hockey arenas that needed something to do on dark nights, and spent thirty years as a minor attraction. Two rule changes and one rivalry turned it into the most watched basketball in the world.

The moments

  1. 1946

    Basketball for the empty nights

    The Basketball Association of America was founded by the owners of hockey arenas in the north-east and Canada. In 1949 it absorbed the older National Basketball League and took the name it still has.

  2. 1950

    The colour line

    Chuck Cooper was drafted, Nat Clifton signed, and Earl Lloyd — by an accident of the schedule — played first, on 31 October. All three entered the league in the same season.

  3. 1954

    Twenty-four seconds

    Teams had been sitting on leads and games were finishing in the twenties. The shot clock forced a shot on every possession, scoring jumped by more than a dozen points a game in one season, and the sport became watchable.

  4. 1962

    One hundred

    Wilt Chamberlain scored a hundred points against the New York Knicks in a neutral-court game in Hershey, Pennsylvania. There is no film of it. He averaged 50.4 points a game across that whole season.

  5. 1969

    Eleven in thirteen

    Boston, built around Bill Russell, finished a run of eleven championships in thirteen years. No club in a major American sport has matched it, and Russell has more rings than fingers to wear them on.

  6. 1979

    Magic, Bird and a line on the floor

    Larry Bird and Magic Johnson entered the league in the same draft, and the three-point line was introduced in the same season. The rivalry sold the sport; the line eventually rewrote how it is played.

  7. 1984

    Third pick

    Michael Jordan was taken third, behind a centre who played most of his career injured. Chicago won six titles in eight seasons with him and none without.

  8. 1992

    The Dream Team

    Professionals were allowed into the Olympics and the United States sent Jordan, Johnson, Bird and nine others to Barcelona. Opposing players asked for photographs before tip-off. It made the NBA a global league in one fortnight.

  9. 2016

    73–9, and then 3–1

    Golden State won seventy-three regular-season games, one more than the 1996 Bulls, then lost the Finals to Cleveland from three games to one up. Both records still stand, awkwardly, side by side.

  10. 2023

    The scoring record changes hands

    LeBron James passed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s career points total in February, thirty-nine years after it was set, in his twentieth season.

Records that stand

100points in one gameWilt Chamberlain, 2 March 1962
50.4points a game across a seasonWilt Chamberlain, 1961/62
11championships won by one playerBill Russell, Boston
73–9the best regular seasonGolden State Warriors, 2015/16
2,973the three-point record, passed in December 2021Ray Allen’s mark, broken by Stephen Curry

Roll of honour

18Boston Celticschampionships
17Los Angeles Lakerschampionships
6Chicago Bullschampionships
7Golden State Warriorschampionships
5San Antonio Spurschampionships

Championship counts include titles won in earlier cities — the Lakers in Minneapolis, the Warriors in Philadelphia.