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The first basketball game has nine players to a team and used a soccer ball as the first basketball. Since this first game basketball has evolved into one of the world's most popular games with some of the world's most recognizable and popular athletes. The indoor winter program at the YMCA consisted of calisthenics and gymnastics, which bored the students tremendously. In fact there were so many student complainants that two other physical education instructors at the Springfield YMCA quit rather than deal with the problems. James Naismith, a thirty-one year old physical education instructor at the YMCA decided to devise a game to relieve this boredom. First he devised a game that was a cross between soccer, lacrosse, and football, however the game was too rough to play indoors. Then Naismith became intrigued when he saw rugby players throwing their rugby ball into a box suspended off of the gym floor. Naismith went back to the YMCA and asked the janitor, Pops Stebbins, to suspend two boxes, one at either end of the gym, from the railing of the balcony which was ten feet high. Pops Stebbins was not able to find two boxes so he hung two peach baskets on the balcony railing instead. Naismith then posted thirteen simple rules which embodied five basic principles that still govern today's game. These principles were: to use a ball, large, light and handled with the hands, no running with the ball , no player shall be restricted from getting the ball at any time, both teams are to occupy the same area but there is to be no physical contact, and the goal shall be horizontal and elevated. After reading the rules, Naismith's physical education class of eighteen students was split up into two teams of nine and started playing. The game went on for a while with no score until William R. Chase made a shot from the middle of the gymnasium and the game ended with a 1-0 score. The students loved the new game, so Naismith asked them to help him name it. The first suggestion was "Naismith ball" but this was quickly rejected by Naismith. Then a student named Frank Mahon suggested the name "Basket ball" which has stuck ever since. News of the new game spread quickly. Naismith quickly received many letters from various groups and associations asking for the rules of basketball. Due to the number of letters received Naismith published the rules in the Springfield YMCA newspaper the Triangle. The game quickly spread to other YMCAs all over the country. Soon crowds started showing up to watch basketball in Naismith's classes. So on February 12, 1892 Naismith staged a boys basketball game for the public which drew over one-hundred spectators. The game ended in a 2-2 tie. The local newspaper the Springfield Daily Republican wrote that "The game is a very pretty to watch." This lead to another public game being played on March 12, 1892 which featured the Springfield YMCA faculty against the students. The students won 5-1, but more importantly the game drew over two-hundred spectators. Naismith then took some of his students on an exhibition tour through New York and Rhode Island to promote the new game. Then the Brooklyn YMCA began playing basketball against other YMCA branches in New York City. The spreading of basketball was not limited to the U.S. however, basketball spread to France in 1893, Great Britian, China, Australia and India in 1894 and Japan in 1900. Basketball rules were very different back then in comparison with modern rules. In the beginning, basketball varied as to where the game was being played. Team sizes varied with the class sizes. In 1894 new rules were adopted that called for five players when the playing surface was less than eighteen hundred square feet, seven players when the playing surface was between eighteen hundred square feet and thirty six hundred square feet, and nine players when the playing surface exceeded thirty six hundred square feet. By 1897 the rules were changed to five players per team and this number has remained. Also there were many variations in the courts. At first the courts were oddly shaped often with obstructions like pillars and stairways in the way so in 1903 it was ruled that all boundary lines must be straight and there be no obstacles in the court. In 1895 the points for making a field goal were reduced from three points to two points and for free throws the points were reduced from three to one. In 1901 dribbling was legalized, however it could be done only once by a player and it had to be done with both hand. Also a player could not shoot if they had dribbled. In 1909 the rule was changed so that a dribbler could shoot and also the two handed dribble was made illegal. Two years later the rule regarding personal fouls was changed. After four personal fouls the player was out of the rest of the game. In 1921 the rules were changed to allow a player to reenter the game once. Up until now once a player left a game he could not return. The next year running with the ball or traveling was changed from a foul to a violation. In 1929 the charging foul was invented. This foul is called on the offensive player when the offensive player loses control of himself and runs into a defensive player who has already established position in a certain area. In 1931 the held ball or jump ball was invented. This is when two players on opposite teams hold the ball jointly keeping the ball out of play. When this happens there is to be a jump ball. In 1933 the half court line was installed. The offense, after taking the ball out of bounds, had ten seconds to get it over the half court line, if they did not get it over they would lose their possession of the ball. Also after they established possession in their half of the court they could not go back to the other half while they still had possession of the ball. This rule was put in to cut down on stalling. The next year reentering the game twice was made legal. And finally the last rule change during the early years of basketball was the installation of the three second violation. This rule stated that no player without the ball could stay in the free throw lane for longer than three seconds without the ball. There were also many changes in the equipment during the early years of basketball. For instance, in 1893 the Narragansett Machinery Company of Providence, RI developed and marketed the first iron rim with a rope basket to catch the ball. Nets that were open at the bottom were not adopted until 1913. In 1894 the first basketball was marketed. Up until now a soccer ball was used to play the game. The first basketballs were thirty two inches in circumference and were laced. But in 1849 when the laceless ball was made official, the circumference of the ball was reduced from thirty two inches two thirty. In 1895 teams began putting four by six foot screen behind the baskets to keep the spectators from hitting the ball in or out of the hoop and soon after this screen was replaced by wood which also served as a backboard. The opaque glass backboard was legalized in 1908 and the fan shaped backboard was legalized in 1940 and transparent glass backboards were legalized in 1946. Lastly in 1940 the baseline was moved back four feet to reduce the frequent stepping out of bounds. The invention of basketball lead to a giant surge in the membership of YMCAs. However a gym that could accommodate fifty to sixty students was now being used by only ten to eighteen students. This lead to many YMCAs to outlaw basketball within five years of its invention. This angered many YMCA patrons, especially the ones who joined specifically to play basketball so many canceled their memberships. This induced the displaced YMCA members to start playing at other places such as halls. This eventually lead to the professionalization of the sport. Basketball soon caught on as a collegiate sport and this played a major part in the great expansion of basketball. The first game ever played in college was in 1895 when the Minnesota School of Agriculture and Mining beat Hamline College 9-3. The YMCA and the AAU (Ameteur Athletic Union) jointly ran the rules committee. However several colleges did not like the fact that they had no say in the rules. So Ralph Morgan, the Penn athletic director organized a series of meetings that lead to the formation of the Intercollegiate Athletic Association which was a precursor to the NCAA. This association established a separate set of rules exclusively for the college game. However the Intercollegiate Athletic Association officials soon reconciled with the members of the AAU and YMCA rules committee and the three merged together in1915 to become the National Basketball Committee or NBC. This committee served as the sole ameteur rule making committee in both America and Canada from 1936-1979. In 1979 both the NCAA and the National Federation of State High School Associations broke away so they could each form their own rules committee. In 1905 there were eighty eight colleges engaged in intercollegiate basketball, but by 1915 there were three hundred sixty six. Interest in college basketball was really taking off. To capitalize on this popularity, officials in New York City created the National Invitation Tournament or the NIT. This tournament was used to crown the national champion until the NCAA made a tournament of its own. These college made basketball a major national sport. The rise of college basketball was a forerunner to the rise pro basketball. The first pro basketball league was formed in 1898, it was called the National Basketball League or NBL. The league did not last due to the inability of the weaker to meet expenses. The two strongest professional teams prior to the days of the NBA, and ABA were the Original Celtics and the New York Renaissance or Rens. The Original Celtics in the 1922-23 season won two hundred four out of two hundred fifteen games. However they disbanded in 1928. The New York Rens was an all black team that dominated professional basketball until the advent of the NBA. The depression hurt many professional basketball teams and this lead to the reformation of the NBL. The NBL was joined by the Basketball Association of America or BAA in1946. The two leagues had a two year war in which each league would try and lure the other's best players away. However the two year war ended when the two leagues merged in 1949. The new league was called the NBA. To promote team parity, the NBA instituted the college draft. The teams would select in inverse order of the final standings so that the worst teams got the first picks. Then in the 19554-55 season three radical rules changed the pro game. First, the twenty four second shot clock was implemented. Second, a bonus free throw was awarded to a team anytime the opposing team commits more than six fouls. Lastly, two free throws were awarded for any backcourt foul. The NBA took its place as the third most popular major sport in America in the late 1950s. Basketball continued to grow but at a slow pace due to its lack of TV coverage. Then in 1967 George Mikan, a former great NBA player formed the ABA or the American Basketball Association. The ABA generated a lot of interest in basketball with their young high flying stars like Julius Erving and George Gervin. Each year the two leagues waged war competing for the top collegiate players. However the ABA went bankrupt in 1976 and disbanded. The NBA took four of the ABA teams. These teams were the Houston Rockets, the San Antonio Spurs, the Indiana Pacers and the New Jersey Nets. This expansion and cable television along with some great players lead the NBA into a golden age in which basketball enjoyed its biggest growth in over fifty years. Some great rivalries such Magic versus Bird and Michael versus Charles along with the greed of other major sporting leagues pushed basketball the the forefront. Pro basketball is not the only popular basketball league. NCAA basketball is one of the most watched sports in the country with the NCAA tournament. The Final Four is such a popular even that a court side ticket at the 1996 Final Four in Madison Square Garden in New York went for ten thousand dollars. In about one hundred years basketball has evolved from nothing into the game it is today. It has grown and prospered through the last hundred years. Its fast pace and high flying aerial displays have made it one of the most popular games in America. Bibliography: BIBLIOGRAPHY 1. Neft, David S. The Sports Encyclopedia: Pro Basketball. St. Martin's Press, New York City, 1989 2. Douchant, Mike. Encyclopedia of College Basketball. Visible Ink Press, Detroit, 1992 3. McClain, Aaron. Naismith: The Founder of Basketball. Bantam Books, Toronto, 1986 Word Count: 2348
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