The History of the NBA

The league that would go on to become the National Basketball Association was founded in 1946. The Basketball Association of America, as it was called, was initially created to put basketball into major arenas that were already available and major cities.

This would be a role reversal for how fans know the American sports leagues today. At the time, it was hockey which was much more established and popular and basketball had yet to really catch on with the public. And so, it was that the hockey arenas and the owners of them would seek out basketball, primarily around the northeast section of the country.

The BAA was not the first basketball league, but it was the first to play in so many major cities and in the massive arenas that they did. This gave power and legitimacy to the league, although it did not mean the BAA had the best players and teams either.

This is proven out by the fact that two teams that moved to the BAA in its first years immediately won the championship. In 1948 this was done by the Baltimore Bullets and in 1949 this was done by the Minneapolis Lakers.

However this problem would soon be solved when in 1949 the BAA merged with the NBL, the National Basketball League. The new league, entitled the National Basketball Association now had 17 teams but was a hodgepodge collection of teams from major markets playing in huge arenas to teams from small Midwestern towns playing in high school size gyms. For this and a variety of other reasons, the league whittled down its teams until it had only 8 left in 1954.

These 8 teams are the most storied of the current NBA, including the Knicks, the Lakers, the 76ers and the Celtics. The league integrated in 1950 and would begin transforming until a game played by much larger and much more athletic men. George Mikan and the Lakers were the first dynasty of the league, winning 5 championships.

They were followed by Bill Russell and the Celtics, who in the most dominant stretch of any major American sports team or league, would win 11 championships in the span of 13 seasons. These two dynasties created the first legitimate rivalry in the league, between the Lakers and the Celtics. It’s a rivalry that holds true to this day, having been revived this past season, culminating in another Celtics championship, won against their longtime rivals the Lakers.

The league expanded to have 18 teams by the mid 1970s but by then was losing talent and fans to the American Basketball Association. The ABA was eventually folded into the NBA, boosting the NBA’s total number of teams to 22. However the league would go into a lull until that storied rivalry picked up again led by Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.

These were just two players who with their styles and intensity helped revive a struggling NBA. Of course Michael Jordan would come just several years later and those three players would spearhead the reemergence of the NBA for over a decade.

Today the league and the game has spread so effectively to all stretches of the globe, that the Americans are not the foregone best players in the world. Other countries rival and beat the American team at the Olympics and in international competitions.