Basketball – Innovator – James Naismith

In early December 1891, Canadian James Naismith, a physical education professor and instructor at the International Young Men’s Christian Association Training School (YMCA) (today, Springfield College) in Springfield, Massachusetts, was trying to keep his gym class active on a rainy day. He sought a vigorous indoor game to keep his students occupied and at proper levels of fitness during the long New England winters. After rejecting other ideas as either too rough or poorly suited to walled-in gymnasiums, he wrote the basic rules and nailed a peach basket onto a 10-foot elevated track. In contrast with modern basketball nets, this peach basket retained its bottom, and balls had to be retrieved manually after each “basket” or point scored; this proved inefficient, however, so the bottom of the basket was removed, allowing the balls to be poked out with a long dowel each time.

Old style basketball with laces – Basketball was originally played with a soccer ball. These round balls from “association football” were made, at the time, with a set of laces to close off the hole needed for inserting the inflatable bladder after the other sewn-together segments of the ball’s cover had been flipped outside-in. These laces could cause bounce passes and dribbling to be unpredictable. Eventually a lace-free ball construction method was invented, and this change to the game was endorsed by Naismith. (Whereas in American football, the lace construction proved to be advantageous for gripping and remains to this day.) The first balls made specifically for basketball were brown, and it was only in the late 1950s that Tony Hinkle, searching for a ball that would be more visible to players and spectators alike, introduced the orange ball that is now in common use. Dribbling was not part of the original game except for the “bounce pass” to teammates. Passing the ball was the primary means of ball movement. Dribbling was eventually introduced but limited by the asymmetric shape of early balls. [dubious – discuss] Dribbling was common by 1896, with a rule against the double dribble by 1898.

The peach baskets were used until 1906 when they were finally replaced by metal hoops with backboards. A further change was soon made, so the ball merely passed through. Whenever a person got the ball in the basket, his team would gain a point. Whichever team got the most points won the game. The baskets were originally nailed to the mezzanine balcony of the playing court, but this proved impractical when spectators in the balcony began to interfere with shots. The backboard was introduced to prevent this interference; it had the additional effect of allowing rebound shots. Naismith’s handwritten diaries, discovered by his granddaughter in early 2006, indicate that he was nervous about the new game he had invented, which incorporated rules from a children’s game called duck on a rock, as many had failed before it.

Frank Mahan, one of the players from the original first game, approached Naismith after the Christmas break, in early 1892, asking him what he intended to call his new game. Naismith replied that he hadn’t thought of it because he had been focused on just getting the game started. Mahan suggested that it be called “Naismith ball”, at which he laughed, saying that a name like that would kill any game. Mahan then said, “Why not call it basketball?” Naismith replied, “We have a basket and a ball, and it seems to me that would be a good name for it.” The first official game was played in the YMCA gymnasium in Albany, New York, on January 20, 1892, with nine players. The game ended at 1 – 0; the shot was made from 25 feet, on a court just half the size of a present-day Streetball or National Basketball Association (NBA) court.

At the time, football was being played with 10 to a team (which was increased to 11). When winter weather got too icy to play football, teams were taken indoors, and it was convenient to have them split in half and play basketball with five on each side. By 1897 – 1898 teams of five became standard.

1899 University of Kansas basketball team, with James Naismith at the back, right.	Dr. James Naismith, inventor of the sport of basketball

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Inventor: James Naismith

James Naismith (November 6, 1861 – November 28, 1939) was a Canadian-American physical educator, physician, Christian chaplain, sports coach, and innovator. The same year he left Canada for Springfield, Massachusetts, he invented the game of basketball. He wrote the original basketball rule book and founded the University of Kansas basketball program. Naismith lived to see basketball adopted as an Olympic demonstration sport in 1904 and as an official event at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, as well as the birth of the National Invitation Tournament (1938) and the NCAA Tournament (1939).

Born and raised on a farm near Almonte, Ontario, Naismith studied and taught physical education at Montreal’s McGill University before moving to the United States, where he designed the game of basketball in late 1891 while teaching at the International YMCA Training School in Springfield, Massachusetts. Seven years after inventing basketball, Naismith received his medical degree in Denver in 1898. He then arrived at the University of Kansas, later becoming the Kansas Jayhawks’ athletic director and coach. While a coach at Kansas, Naismith coached Phog Allen, who later became the coach at Kansas for 39 seasons, beginning a lengthy and prestigious coaching tree. Allen then went on to coach legends including Adolph Rupp and Dean Smith, among others, who themselves coached many notable players and future coaches. Despite coaching his final season in 1907, Naismith is still the only coach in Kansas men’s basketball history with a losing record

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Space Jam – Release Date: July 16, 2021

A New Legacy (also known as Space Jam 2) is an upcoming 2021 American live-action/animated sports comedy film directed by Malcolm D. Lee. The film is a standalone sequel to the 1996 film Space Jam and stars NBA player LeBron James, as well as Don Cheadle and Sonequa Martin-Green. The film also features the Looney Tunes characters such as Bugs Bunny, Lola Bunny, and Daffy Duck. James also acts as a producer alongside Ryan Coogler, who co-wrote the script with Sev Ohanian.

Space Jam: A New Legacy is scheduled to be released in the United States on July 16, 2021, by Warner Bros.