March 26, 1963: The End of the Syracuse Nationals

March 26, 1963: The Cincinnati Royals defeat the Syracuse Nationals, 131-127, at the Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium in Syracuse, in Game 5 of an NBA 1st round Playoff series.

The Royals, led by University of Cincinnati stars Oscar Robertson and Jack Twyman, move on to face the defending champion Boston Celtics. Robertson scored 32 points, Twyman 24, while Lee Shaffer scored 45 in defeat for the Nats.

The Nats, led by veteran stars Dolph Schayes and Johnny "Red" Kerr and young sensations Hal Greer and Chet "the Jet" Walker, have played their last game. In the off-season, they will move to fill the void caused by the move of the Philadelphia Warriors to San Francisco. They will be known as the Philadelphia 76ers.

Dante "Danny" Biasone, an Italian immigrant, founded the Nats in the National Basketball League in 1946. In 1949, they were a part of the merger with the Basketball Association of America, which formed the National Basketball Association. They lost the NBA Finals to the Minneapolis Lakers in 1950 and 1954, before winning the title in 1955, beating the Fort Wayne Pistons in the Finals.

Their Hall-of-Famers included guards Greer, Larry Costello and Dick Barnett; forwards Schayes, Walker, Al Cervi and Earl Lloyd; head coach Alex Hannum; and founding owner Danny Biasone, who devised the NBA's 24-second shot clock in 1954.

But, like their neighbors the Rochester Royals, and the Pistons, they found themselves stuck in a market too small to support a major league sports team. Biasone sold the Nats to Irv Kosloff and Ike Richman, who moved them to their hometown of Philadelphia, to fill the void left the year before, when the Philadelphia Warriors moved to San Francisco.

Although it is the seat of a major university, Syracuse is now home to less than 150,000 people, with 660,000 in which can generously be called a "metropolitan area." It might be fairer to say that, like Rochester, it belongs in a single market with Buffalo, 150 miles away.

Built in 1951, the Nationals' arena, the Onondaga County War Memorial, still stands, under the name of the Upstate Medical University Arena. Like its relatively close contemporary, the Blue Cross Arena in Rochester, it is now known for hosting minor-league hockey, the American Hockey League's Syracuse Crunch.

With the Buffalo Bills having gone 0-4 in Super Bowls, the Buffalo Sabres having gone 0-2 in Stanley Cup Finals, and the NBA's Buffalo Braves having lasted only 8 seasons, the 1955 Syracuse Nationals remain the last World Championship team from Western New York.

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March 26, 1963 was a Tuesday. Baseball was in Spring Training. Football was out of season. There was 1 other game in the NBA Playoffs: The St. Louis Hawks beat the Detroit Pistons, 104-100 at Cobo Hall (now Huntington Place) in Detroit. Bob Pettit scored 35 for the Hawks.

And the Stanley Cup Playoffs got underway. The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-1 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Detroit Red Wings, 5-4 at the Chicago Stadium.