November 24, 1960: Wilt Chamberlain Grabs 55 Rebounds In a Game

November 24, 1960: Wilt Chamberlain of the Philadelphia Warriors grabs 55 rebounds, setting an NBA record that still stands. He also scored 34 points. And it wasn't against a "slow white guy" or a "plumber," as LeBron James' worshipers say of Wilt's competition today: It was against Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics, the other serious contender for the title of the best player in the sport at the time. The entire Celtic team had 59 rebounds. Russell had 19 of them, which would be a great total by today's standards.

But the Celtics won, 132-129, at the Philadelphia Civic Center. Wilt set lots of records, but Russell (almost) always had the better team. That's why Wilt was prouder of this record than the 100 points he scored against the New York Knicks in a 1962 game: Because it was against the Celtics, particularly with Russell guarding him.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar surpassed Wilt's record for career points of 31,419 in 1984, but Wilt's record of 23,924 career rebounds has never been seriously challenged. And it won't be: The days of great rebounders ended with Wilt's career in 1973. Russell is 2nd with 21,620. The only player active in the 2021-22 season who was in the Top 10, and even that at 10th place, was Dwight Howard with 14,627.

*

November 24, 1960 was a Thursday, a Thanksgiving Day. There were 2 other NBA games played. The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Cincinnati Royals, 108-100 at the Cincinnati Gardens. Elgin Baylor had 33 points and 19 rebounds for the Lakers. Jack Twyman scored 35 and Oscar Robertson 30 for the Royals.

And the St. Louis Hawks beat the Syracuse Nationals, 132-97 at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis. Bob Pettit had  31 points and 19 rebounds for the Hawks.

Baseball was out of season. In the NFL, the Detroit Lions beat the Green Bay Packers, 23-10 at Briggs Stadium in Detroit. The ballpark was renamed Tiger Stadium the next year.

In the brand-new American Football League, which embraced a pass-happy, high-scoring approach, the New York Titans beat the Dallas Texans, 41-35 at the Polo Grounds. In 1963, both teams changed their names: The Titans became the New York Jets, and the Texans moved, becoming the Kansas City Chiefs. In 1999, the original AFL team that had been the Houston Oilers, now playing in Tennessee, became the Tennessee Titans.

These college football games were played:

* The University of Pennsylvania beat Cornell, 18-7 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* The University of Richmond beat the College of William & Mary, 19-0 at City Stadium in Richmond, Virginia.

* Virginia Tech beat the Virginia Military Institute, 13-12 at Victory Stadium in Roanoke, Virginia.

* Wichita State beat West Texas State (now named West Texas A&M), 31-14 at Veterans Field in Wichita, Kansas.

* Texas beat Texas A&M, 21-14 at Memorial Stadium in Austin, Texas.

* And the University of Denver beat Colorado State, 21-12 at DU Stadium in Denver.

The NHL was then based in Canada, where Thanksgiving is celebrated on the 2nd Monday in October, not the 4th Thursday in November. But the entire "Original Six" was in action that day:

* The New York Rangers beat the Boston Bruins, 5-3 at the Boston Garden.

* The Detroit Red Wings, despite playing on the same day as the Detroit Lions, sold out the Olympia Stadium, and beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-1.

* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 2-1 at the Chicago Stadium.

November 16, 1962: "One Day In the Life of Ivan Denisovich" Is Published

November 16, 1962: One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn begins to be serialized in Novy Mir (New World), a Soviet literary magazine. It was assigned to my high school English class, and it took me most of the book before I realized that "Shukhov," the apparent protagonist, and "Ivan Denisovich," as he was addressed by the gulag guard, were the same person. It was even longer -- seeing an interview in which Gorbachev was addressed by the journalist as "Mikhail Sergeyevich" -- before I understood that Russians informally addressed each other by "(First name) (middle name)" instead of "(First name)."

The story is set in a Soviet labor camp in the early 1950s, when Joseph Stalin was still alive and in charge of the Soviet Union. The book's publication was an extraordinary event in Soviet literary history, since never before had an account of Stalinist repressions been openly distributed.

Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008), like his character Shukov, had been a dedicated Communist who was falsely accused of being a spy during World War II, and spent 8 years in a gulag. He was then sent into exile for criticizing Stalin in a private letter. This led him to return to his family's Russian Orthodox Church. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970.

But his 1973 publication of The Gulag Archipelago made him a chelovek ne privetstvuyetsya -- that's Russian for "persona non grata." He lived in America from 1976 to 1994, having had his Russian citizenship restored, and he moved back to his homeland.

*

November 16, 1962 was a Friday. Baseball season was over. Football was in midweek. And no NHL games were scheduled. But there were 3 NBA games played that day:

* The New York Knicks lost to the San Francisco Warriors, 127-111 at the old Madison Square Garden. Wilt Chamberlain had a good night for the Warriors, scoring 73 points.

* The Syracuse Nationals beat the Boston Celtics, 113-105 at the Onondaga County War Memorial (now the Upstate Medical University Arena) in Syracuse, New York.

* And the Cincinnati Royals beat the St. Louis Hawks, 120-111 at the Cincinnati Gardens.

October 28, 1962: The Cuban Missile Crisis Is Resolved

Herbert Block (Herblock) cartoon in The Washington Post,

November 1, 1962: JFK says, "Let's get a lock for this thing."

October 28, 1962: The Cuban Missile Crisis is resolved, as Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev

announces that he has ordered the removal of Soviet missile bases in Cuba, as demanded by President John F. Kennedy.

In a secret deal between them, JFK agrees to the withdrawal of U.S. missiles from Turkey. The fact that the Turkey part of the deal is not made public makes it look like the Soviets have backed down, rather than that the deal was a true compromise.

On October 25, Adlai Stevenson, the former 2-time Democratic nominee for President who was now the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, attended an emergency session of the U.N.'s Security Council. The Soviet Ambassador, Valerian Zorin, said, "Falsity is what the United States has in its hands, false evidence."

Except it wasn't false. Unlike Colin Powell, addressing the threat of Iraq in the same room 40 years later, Stevenson actually had proof that America's would-be opponent had weapons of mass destruction, only 90 miles from the coast of Florida.

He forcefully asked Zorin if his country was installing missiles in Cuba. Like every delegate, he was wearing a headset, into which someone who spoke both his language and that of the speaker was translating. But Stevenson knew that Zorin spoke English, and demanded an answer, his voice rising:

All right, sir, let me ask you one simple question: Do you, Ambassador Zorin, deny that the U.S.S.R. has placed, and is placing, medium- and intermediate-range missiles and sites in Cuba? Yes or no? Don’t wait for the translation! Yes or no?

Zorin refused to answer. Stevenson said, "I am prepared to wait for my answer until Hell freezes over, if that's your decision. And I am also prepared to present the evidence in this room." Zorin remained silent. Stevenson passed the photos around -- taken by a U-2 "spy plane." It had been nearly 2 1/2 years since the Soviets had shot one down over their territory, casting a pall over the last year in office of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. But "Ike" and JFK had both kept the U-2s flying, and it's a good thing they did.

Everyone was on edge. My mother was a junior in high school, and on the Friday, October 26, one of her teachers gave homework, and said that if you didn't want to do it, that's okay, because we might not have school on Monday -- or ever again. 

There were at least 3 false alarms at U.S. military bases, including a bear that had wandered on and touched a fence, setting off an intruder alert.

Much of the world thought that this was it, that World War III was assured, that the NFL and AFL games of this day might be the last sporting events that they'd ever see, or even that they would be prevented. They weren't, because Kennedy and Khrushchev both understood that nobody "wins" a nuclear war, they settled the Crisis on terms acceptable to both countries, and the world moved on.

One event the world moved on to was the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, signed on July 26, 1963 by JFK, Khrushchev, and British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, banning nuclear testing in the atmosphere -- including above the Arctic Circle.

Another was the establishment of the Hot Line, a direct connection between the White House and the Kremlin, to make for quicker diplomacy, in the hope that something like the Cuban Missile Crisis would never happen again. The Hot Line has been used a few times since, and nothing like the Cuban Missile Crisis has.

*

October 28, 1962 was a Sunday. The baseball season ended on October 16, as the New York Yankees beat the San Francisco Giants 1-0 in Game 7 of the World Series, the 1st Series to be between a team on the Atlantic Coast and a team on the Pacific Coast. (The Dodgers had already been in a World Series since their move from Brooklyn to Los Angeles, in 1959, but their opponent was the Chicago White Sox, not a coastal team. The Dodgers won it.)

There was 1 NBA game played that day. The Cincinnati Royals beat the San Francisco Warriors, 131-130 at the Cincinnati Gardens. The Warriors were in their 1st season on the Coast, after playing in Philadelphia. They changed their name to the Golden State Warriors in 1971.

Wilt Chamberlain scored 53 points and grabbed 27 rebounds. Just another day at the office for the greatest basketball player who ever lived. But Oscar Robertson, himself a serious contender for that title, scored 36 to lead the team now named the Sacramento Kings to victory.

For the NHL, this was the "Original Six" era, and 4 of the 6 played. The New York Rangers lost to the Chicago Black Hawks, 5-3 at the old Madison Square Garden. And the Detroit Red Wings beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 2-0 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit. The Montreal Canadiens and the Boston Bruins did not play.

And there was football. In the NFL, at the original Yankee Stadium. Y.A. Tittle tied an NFL record with 7 touchdown passes, and the New York Giants beat the Washington Redskins 49-34.

Tittle is 1 of 8 NFL quarterbacks to have thrown 7 touchdown passes in a single game. Sid Luckman of the Chicago Bears did it against the Giants in 1943. Adrian Burk of the Philadelphia Eagles did it against the Redskins in 1954. Although it was in the AFL, the NFL counts George Blanda of the Houston Oilers doing it against the New York Titans (the Jets) in 1961. Joe Kapp of the Minnesota Vikings did it against the Baltimore Colts in 1969.

It was done twice in 2013, by Peyton Manning of the Denver Broncos against the Baltimore Ravens, and by Nick Foles of the Philadelphia Eagles against the Oakland Raiders. In 2015, the Giants were victimized again, by Drew Brees of the New Orleans Saints.

Also on October 28, 1962:

* The Green Bay Packers beat the Baltimore Colts, 17-6 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Johnny Unitas was the greatest quarterback of the era, but Vince Lombardi was the best coach and the best general manager, and had built the best team. From September 24, 1961 to September 13, 1964, the Packers went 38-5-1, including winning the 1961 and 1962 NFL Championship Games.

* The Cleveland Browns beat their arch-rivals, the Pittsburgh Steelers, 41-14 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Dallas Cowboys, 28-24 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

* The Detroit Lions beat the Chicago Bears, 11-3 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.

* The Philadelphia Eagles beat the Minnesota Vikings, 31-21 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

* And the Los Angeles Rams beat their arch-rivals, the San Francisco 49ers, 28-14 at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco.

In the upstart American Football League:

* The New York Titans beat the San Diego Chargers, 23-3 at the Polo Grounds in New York. The Titans changed their name to the New York Jets the next year.

* The Boston Patriots beat the Oakland Raiders, 26-16 at Boston University Field. The stadium would be renamed Nickerson Field in 1964, and the team would be renamed the New England Patriots upon their move to suburban Foxborough, Massachusetts in 1971.

* The Dallas Texans beat the Houston Oilers, 31-7 at Jeppesen Stadium in Houston. The teams would meet again in the AFL Championship Game, and the Texans won. The next year, though, tired of trying to compete for attention with the NFL's Cowboys, they moved, becoming the Kansas City Chiefs.

* The Buffalo Bills beat the Denver Broncos, 45-38 at Bears Field in Denver. Bears Field would be expanded and turned into the original Mile High Stadium.

And actress Daphne Zuniga was born.

October 24, 1959: Wilt Chamberlain's 1st Game

October 24, 1959: The greatest player in the history of basketball makes his NBA debut. If you're paying attention to the date, you will notice that Michael Jordan hasn't been born yet, and neither have LeBron James' parents.

The place is the old Madison Square Garden. The home team is the New York Knicks. The visiting team is the Philadelphia Warriors. Unfortunately for the Knicks, it is the Warriors who have the player in question: West Philadelphia native Wilton Norman Chamberlain.

Wilt, at this point a 23-year-old, 7-foot-1-inch center, scores 43 points and grabs 28 rebounds. Kenny Sears scores 35 for the Knicks, but it's nowhere near enough, as the Warriors beat the Knicks, 118-109. Basketball will never be the same again.

A little more than 2 years later, on March 2, 1962, these teams will play at the Hershey Arena outside Harrisburg, and Wilt will score 100 points in a 169-147 Warriors victory.

*

October 24, 1959 was a Saturday. There were 3 other games in the NBA that day:

* The Boston Celtics beat the Syracuse Nationals, 121-109 at the Onondaga County War Memorial Arena in Syracuse.

* The Cincinnati Royals beat the Detroit Pistons, 108-103 at the Cincinnati Gardens.

* And the Minneapolis Lakers begin their last season before moving to Los Angeles with a 94-87 win over the St. Louis Hawks, at the Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis.

There were 2 NHL games that day. The New York Rangers and the Toronto Maple Leafs played to a 1-1 tie at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. And the Montreal Canadiens beat the Boston Bruins, 5-1 at the Montreal Forum. The Chicago Blackhawks and the Detroit Red Wings were not scheduled.

There were also college football games, including the following:

* Number 1 Louisiana State beat Florida, 9-0 at Florida Field in Gainesville.

* Number 2 Northwestern beat unranked Notre Dame, 30-24 at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana. Yes, you read that right: Northwestern was ranked Number 2, Notre Dame wasn't ranked at all, and the Wildcats beat the Fighting Irish in South Bend. It really happened.

* Number 3 Texas beat Rice, 28-6 at Memorial Stadium in Austin, Texas.

* Number 4 Mississippi beat Number 10 Arkansas, 28-0 on neutral ground at Crump Stadium in Memphis.

* Number 5 USC beat Stanford, 30-28 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

* Number 6 Syracuse beat West Virginia, 44-0 at Archbold Stadium in Syracuse, New York.

* The day before, Number 7 Auburn beat the University of Miami, 21-6 at the Orange Bowl in Miami.

* Number 8 Penn State beat Number 13 Illinois, 20-9 on neutral ground at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Only 15,045 fans came out. If it had been played on either campus, it would have been a sellout.

* Number 9 Georgia Tech beat Tulane, 21-13 at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans.

* The biggest upset of the week came when Number 11 Oregon lost to the University of Washington, 13-12 at Multnomah Stadium (now Providence Park) in Portland, Oregon.

* Number 12 Wisconsin beat Number 20 Ohio State, 12-3 at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin.

* Number 14 Purdue beat Number 15 Iowa, 14-7 at Ross-Ade Stadium in West Lafayette, Indiana.

* Two days earlier, Number 17 Clemson beat arch-rival South Carolina, 27-0 at Carolina Stadium in Columbia, South Carolina. It would be renamed Williams-Brice Stadium in 1972.

* In a rare post-World War II example of an Ivy League team making the Top 20, Number 19 Yale beat Colgate, 21-0 at the Yale Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut.

* Army beat Colorado State, 25-6 at Michie Stadium in West Point, New York.

* Navy and the University of Pennsylvania played to a 22-22 tie at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* In a cross-State matchup, Brown University beat Rhode Island, 6-0 at Brown Stadium in Providence. (URI is located across the State, in Kingston.)

* Michigan beat Minnesota, 14-6 at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis, to win the Little Brown Jug.

* Rutgers beat Lehigh, 23-0 at Rutgers Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey.

* And Princeton beat Cornell, 20-0 at Schoellkopf Field in Ithaca, New York.

And in English soccer, Arsenal played Leicester City to a 2-2 draw, at Filbert Street in Leicester.

July 6, 1959: The Harlem Globetrotters In Moscow

July 6, 1959: As part of a cultural exchange program, which ends up including the "Kitchen Debate" between Vice President Richard Nixon and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, basketball's Harlem Globetrotters play a game in Moscow, the capital of the Soviet Union.

Since 1927, the all-black Globies -- or the Trotters, if you prefer -- had been entertaining crowds all over the world with trick plays when they could, and with great basketball skill when they had to. They would play anybody, anywhere. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, they played a few games against the top team in the still-all-white pro leagues, the Minneapolis Lakers, and won the 1st 2 times before the Lakers managed to adjust.

Vasily Gricorevich, the director of Lenin Central Statium (later renamed the Luzhniki Stadium), extended an invitation to the Globetrotters. They played 9 games there, outdoors, in front of crowds in excess of 60,000, starting on July 6.

Among the Globetrotter players who made the trip were 3 whose uniform numbers would later be retired by the team: Charles "Tex" Harrison, Number 34; Meadowlark Lemon, Number 36; and Wilt Chamberlain, Number 13.

(They've honored 8 players in total. The others: Reece "Goose" Tatum, Number 50, from the 1940s and early '50s; Marques Haynes, Humber 20, from the same era, and returned as an elder statesman in the 1970s; Hubert "Geese Ausbie, Number 35, and Fred "Curly" Neal, Number 22, who played from the early 1960s to the mid-1980s; and Sweet Lou Dunbar, Number 41, who played in the 1970s and '80s, and now coaches the team.)

Chamberlain had starred at the University of Kansas, and wanted to turn pro, but the NBA wouldn't let him play until his college class had graduated in the Spring of 1959. So he played the 1958-59 season with the Globetrotters, and made more money with them in that one year, and certainly traveled to more places, and more interesting ones, than he did in each of his first few years in the NBA, with his hometown Philadelphia Warriors.

The previous season, 1957-58, Bob Gibson, who had starred on the court for Omaha's Creighton University before a Hall of Fame career pitching for baseball's St. Louis Cardinals, played for the Globetrotters. An urban legend said that Gibson quit because he couldn't stand the clowning, but it was really the constant traveling that made him give baseball a full go. Chamberlain later admitted that he loved the stunts.

In his writeup of the 1st game for Pravda, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, Gregor Belevich was not kind:

This is not basketball; it is too full of tricks. The Harlem Globetrotters from New York City played tonight against Basketball Club Dynamo of Moscow in what was presented to be a virtuous competition of basketball but was in fact nothing of the sort. These Americans are men big of the body, but made small by their deeds...

By relying on hoax and chicanery, these Globetrotters have surely become beholden to deception at the expense of their competitive spirit and industriousness (a more apt team of representatives from America this reporter cannot think of…). While the final score was 98–42 in favor of the Globetrotters, it is better to go to bed supperless than to rise in debt.

Dynamo was then known for its great soccer team, but also had the best basketball team in the U.S.S.R. at the time. It should also be noted that, while Harlem is in New York City, it was chosen as an identifier to indicate that the team was all-black. The team was actually based in Chicago, hometown of their founder, owner and manager, Abe Saperstein. Later ownership groups would move the team's organization to Los Angeles, and now to Phoenix.

But the fans did not agree with Belevich, and loved what they saw. Khrushchev met with them, and awarded them the Order of Lenin. While this medal could be given to Soviet citizens for various forms of service, it was also the highest award the country could give to a foreigner, usually to "Those who promoted friendship and cooperation between people and in strengthening peace."

The 2 leading newspapers in the Soviet Union were Pravda, meaning "Truth"; and Izvestia, meaning "News." This led to a joke: "There is no news in the Truth, and there is no truth in the News."

On this same trip, the Globetrotters played in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and -- no doubt due to some very delicate negotiations, as that nation was still largely closed to the West -- the People's Republic of China. Chamberlain was with them the whole way, before departing for the Warriors.

Interviewing him for his radio show in 1986, Philadelphia basketball historian Sonny Hill, told his listeners, "In the Fifties, they knew about Wilt Chamberlain in China! That's how big of a man he was, and is!" And, in this case, "big" did not refer to the man's physical size, but his impact.

*

July 6, 1959 was a Monday. There were no scores on this historic day: Baseball was in its All-Star Break, and no other sports were in season.

May 12, 1974: The End of the NBA's 1st Great Era

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, guarded by

Dave Cowens (left) and Don Nelson (right)

May 12, 1974: The Boston Celtics beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 102-87, at the Milwaukee Exposition & Convention Center Arena (The MECCA). This was the Celtics' 12th title, but their first without Bill Russell.

The Bucks were in their 2nd Finals, having won the title in 1971, but it took 50 years for them to get back, before they won the title in 2021. In between, they'd usually been good, but not Finals good.

This was also the last game for Oscar Robertson, closing out his career with the Bucks. In fact, this game was the end of an era for the NBA, as legends Jerry West, Willis Reed, Dave DeBusschere, and Robertson's former Cincinnati Royals teammate Jerry Lucas announced their retirements. So would Wilt Chamberlain, although he hadn't played this season, due to a contract dispute between the NBA and the ABA.

A year and a half later, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar demanded a trade, and got it, going to the Los Angeles Lakers. The Bucks were usually good thereafter, but they would not return to the NBA Finals until 2021.

The 1974 NBA Finals was the end of an era, when men were men, and pretty much only the people in the arena saw the game, because television coverage was so rare. The era of Dr. J, Skywalker, Chocolate Thunder, Magic, Larry, the Human Highlight Film and Air Jordan, an era where substance took a back seat to style, was about to begin. The NBA made a lot more money during that period. But it was not better.

*

May 12, 1974 was a Sunday. The ABA Championship had been won 2 days earlier, by the New York Nets over the Utah Stars.

Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Finals was played that day. The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Boston Bruins, 2-1 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia, and went on to win the series in 7 games. The WHA Playoffs were between the Semifinals and the Finals. The Houston Aeros went on to sweep the Chicago Cougars in 4 straight.

And these games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The New York Yankees were swept in a doubleheader by the Milwaukee Brewers, at Shea Stadium, where the Yankees were groundsharing with the Mets while Yankee Stadium was renvoated. The Brewers won the opener, 7-3. Clyde Wright outpitched Mel Stottlemyre. George "Boomer" Scott went 3-for-4 with 2 RBIs. Lou Piniella hit a home run.

The Brewers won the nightcap, 5-1. Kevin Kobel outpitched Dick Woodson. Dave May homered for the Brewers. Rick Dempsey, later to be traded to the Baltimore Orioles, where he would not be available to succeed Thurman Munson as the Yankees' catcher (Munson was the designated hitter in this game, after catching the opener.)

* The New York Mets lost to the Chicago Cubs, 4-3 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. George Mitterwald singled Matt Alexander home, off Tom Seaver, in the bottom of the 9th. José Cardenal hit a home run for the Cubs, Rusty Staub for the Mets.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 8-7 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Mike Schmidt went 1-for-3 with a walk. Mike Anderson hit a home run. For the Pirates, Willie Stargell went 0-for-4 with a walk, but Richie Zisk went 4-for-5 with 2 RBIs, and Al Oliver went 3-for-5 with a home run and 3 RBIs.

* A doubleheader was split at Atlanta Stadium. (It was renamed Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium the next season.) The Atlanta Braves won the 1st game, 5-1. Hank Aaron went 2-for-3 with a walk and his 721st career home run, before being taken out of the lineup. He did not play in the 2nd game, which the San Francisco Giants won, 6-2.

* The Cincinnati Reds swept the Houston Astros, 5-0 and 4-2 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Fred Norman pitched a 5-hit shutout in the 1st game. Merv Rettenmund hit home runs in both games. Over the 2 games, Pete Rose went 2-for-7 with a walk and an RBI, while Johnny Bench went 2-for-7 with a home run, a walk and an RBI.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 4-3 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Dick McAuliffe, the Tigers' long-time 2nd baseman, doubled Carl Yastrzemski home in the top of the 10th inning, to win the game for the Red Sox. Yastrzemski went 2-for-4 with a walk. Al Kaline went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Texas Rangers, 5-4 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the San Diego Padres, 15-9 at San Diego Stadium (later Jack Murphy Stadium and Qualcomm Stadium). The Padre bullpen melted down in the top of the 13th inning, so if new team owner Ray Kroc thought Opening Day was "the most stupid ballplaying I've ever seen," then he hadn't seen anything yet.

* The Kansas City Royals swept a doubleheader from the California Angels, 3-2 and 5-2 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Hal McRae singled Amos Otis home in the top of the 9th to win the 1st game. The Royals scored all 5 runs of the 2nd game in the 8th inning. George Brett did not play in the 1st game, and went 0-for-2 in the 2nd game before being replaced. He may have been injured.

* The Oakland Athletics beat the Minnesota Twins, 9-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Reggie Jackson did not play. Harmon Killebrew went 0-for-2 with a walk. Rod Carew went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Baltimore Orioles and the Cleveland Indians were rained out at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The game was made up as part of a doubleheader on July 25. The Indians swept, 8-7 and 5-4. They won the 2nd game when Tommy McCraw singled John Ellis home in the bottom of the 13th inning.

* And the Montreal Expos and the St. Louis Cardinals were rained out at Jarry Park in Montreal. The game was made up as part of a doubleheader on August 6. The Cards swept, 5-4 and 9-4.

May 10, 1973: The Knicks' Last Title & Wilt Chamberlain's Last Game

UPDATE: The Knicks won another NBA Championship in 2026.

May 10, 1973: The New York Knickerbockers beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 102-93, at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California, winning Game 5 of the NBA Finals, and taking the NBA Championship.

In this clincher, the Knicks used only 8 players: Earl Monroe scored 23 points, Bill Bradley 20, Walt Frazier and Willis Reed 18 each, Jerry Lucas 10, Phil Jackson 6, Dean Meminger 5, and Dave DeBusschere (a more defense-oriented player) 2.

For the Lakers: Gail Goodrich scored 28, Wilt Chamberlain 23 (and had 21 rebounds), Jim McMillan 19, Jerry West 12, Bill Bridges 9, Keith Erickson 2, and Happy Hairston, Mel Counts and Pat Riley didn't score any.

For the Knicks, this capped their greatest period ever: 1970 to 1973, 4 seasons, 3 trips to the Finals (all against the Lakers), 2 titles. Their only 2 titles.

Hail the champions: William "Red" Holzman, head coach; Eddie Donovan, general manager; 6, Tom Riker, center; 7, Dean "the Dream" Meminger, guard; 10, Walt "Clyde" Frazier, guard; 12, Dick Barnett, guard; 15 Earl "the Pearl" Monroe, guard; 17, Henry Bibby, guard; 18, Phil Jackson, forward; 19, Willis Reed, center, team Captain; 22, Dave "Double D" DeBusschere, forward; 23, Luther Rackley, center; 24, Bill Bradley, forward; 32, Jerry Lucas, forward; 40, John Gianelli, center; and 43, Harthorne Wingo, forward.

Frazier, Barnett, Reed, DeBusschere and Bradley also played for the Knicks on their 1969-70 title. Jackson was in the organization at that time, but missed the entire season due to injury.

Members of the 1970 Knicks who were not also 1973 Knicks were center Nate Bowman (Number 17), forwards Don May (5), Dave Stallworth (9), Bill Hosket (20) and Jazzy Cazzie Russell (33); and guards Mike Riordan (6) and John Warren (16).

Frazier, Barnett, Reed, DeBusschere and Bradley would have their uniform numbers retired by the Knicks. Holzman would be honored with a banner with the number 613 on it, for the number of games he won as Knicks coach. Frazier, Jackson, Reed, DeBusschere, Bradley, Lucas and Holzman would be elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame. Frazier, Reed, DeBusschere and Lucas would be elected to the NBA's 50th Anniversary 50 Greatest Players and its 75th Anniversary 75 Greatest Players -- though it should be noted that Lucas was elected for what he did with the Cincinnati Royals; he was a stabilizing veteran presence for the '73 Knicks.

In 1996, as part of the league's 50th Anniversary celebrations, the NBA named Reed, Frazier, DeBusschere, Monroe and Lucas to its 50 Greatest Players. In 2021, as part of their 75th Anniversary celebrations, they were named to the 75 Greatest Players. Bradley was not named to either list.

Bibby was the father of later NBA All-Star Mike Bibby. Bradley was elected to 3 terms in the U.S. Senate, representing New Jersey, and ran for President in 2000.

And, yes, kids, that Phil Jackson, the one who would coach the Chicago Bulls to 6 titles and the Lakers to 5. He was a decent player, not a great one. As was Pat Riley, who played for the Lakers against the Knicks in those Finals, and would later coach the Lakers to 4 titles, the Knicks into a Finals, and the Miami Heat to a title.

After one more year, Reed, DeBusschere and Lucas all retired, and the Knicks began to fall apart. Pearl, obtained from the Baltimore Bullets (forerunner of the Washington Wizards) after the Bullets beat the Knicks in the '71 Eastern Conference Finals, was the last to remain, in 1980.

The clinching Game 5 was the last game for NBA legend Wilt Chamberlain. He signed on to be player-coach of the American Basketball Association's San Diego Conquistadors, but an injunction in a legal court kept him off the basketball court, enforcing the last year of his contract with the Lakers.

He sat out the 1973-74 season as a player, got the Conquistadors into the 1st Round of the ABA Playoffs, and then decided he was done with pro basketball. The greatest player in the sport's history -- yes, he was better than Michael Jordan, and he would have eaten LeBron James -- never drew another paycheck from a pro basketball team, in any capacity.

He would, however, have his uniform Number 13 retired by every team he played for: The University of Kansas (1956-58), the Harlem Globetrotters (1958-59), the Golden State Warriors (1959-65, including 1959-62 in Philadelphia), the Philadelphia 76ers (1965-68), and the Lakers (1968-73). And a statue of the West Philadelphia native stands outside the 76ers' Wells Fargo Center.

Jerry West and Oscar Robertson, like Reed, DeBusschere and Lucas, would hang on for one more year. Lew Alcindor had just recently changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Julius "Doctor J" Erving would soon move from the ABA's Virginia Squires to the Nets. Bill Walton was still at UCLA, winning the recent National Championship, the 7th straight for coach John Wooden, in the middle of an 88-game winning streak.

Magic Johnson and Larry Bird were in junior high school. Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing and Charles Barkley were in grade school. Shaquille O'Neal was a rather large baby. Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan and LeBron James weren't born yet.

UPDATE: The Knicks do not have a team Hall of Fame. They have honored 10 men with banners for retiring their uniform number or the equivalent for a coach.

From their 1951, '52 and '53 NBA Finalists, they've retired 15 for guard Dick McGuire. From their 1994 and '99 NBA Finalists, they've retired 33 for center Patrick Ewing.

All other honorees are from their 1970 and 1973 NBA Championships: 10, for guard Walt "Clyde" Frazier; 12, for guard Dick Barnett; 15, for guard Earl "The Pearl" Monroe, 19 for center and Captain Willie Reed, 22 for foreward Dave DeBusschere, 24 for forward Bill Bradley, and head coach William "Red" Holzman has been honored with the number of his coaching wins with the Knicks, 613.

Each of those men is in the Basketball Hall of Fame. Other noteworthy Knicks in the Hall:

* From the 1951, '52 and '53 NBA Finalists: Team founder Ned Irish; and forwards Harry Gallatin and Nat "Sweetwater" Clifton, guard Carl Braun.

* From between the 1953 and 1970 Finals berths: Guard Richie Guerin.

* From the 1973 NBA Champions: Center Jerry Lucas.

* From after the 1973 title: Forwards Bernard King, Amar'e Stoudemire and Carmelo Anthony.

* Marty Glickman, Bob Wolff, Marv Albert, John Andariese, Mike Breen and Frazier have received the Curt Gowdy Media Award, the Hall of Fame's award for broadcasters.

*

May 10, 1973 was a Thursday. The same day the Knicks won the title, the Montreal Canadiens won their 18th Stanley Cup, beating the Chicago Blackhawks in Game 6 of the Finals, 6-4 at the Chicago Stadium. It was their 6th Cup in the last 9 seasons.

Four days earlier, the New England Whalers, then based in Boston, won the 1st World Hockey Association title, the AVCO Cup, beating ex-Blackhawk star Bobby Hull and his Winnipeg Jets.

Two days after the Knicks won their title, the Indiana Pacers won their 3rd ABA Championship in the last 5 years, beating the Louisville-based Kentucky Colonels.

Football was out of season. There were 5 games played in Major League Baseball:

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 4-3 at Fenway Park in Boston. Carl Yastrzemski went 2-for-4 with an RBI.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Detroit Tigers, 8-2 at Royals Stadium (now Kauffman Stadium) in Kansas City. Al Kaline went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Oakland Athletics beat the Texas Rangers, 17-2 at Arlington Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas. Reggie Jackson went 2-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Ray Fosse and Deron Johnson hit home runs. Fosse and Joe Rudi each had 3 RBIs. All this was in support of Ken  Holtzman.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the California Angels, 4-3 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Frank Robinson went 2-for-6 with an RBI for the Angels. Pat Kelly singled home the winning run in the top of the 12th inning.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-3 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Willie McCovey and Dave Kingman hit home runs for the Giants. Lou Brock went 3-for-5, but was caught in his only stolen base attempt. Joe Torre went 1-for-4 with a walk.

May 7, 1972: The Lakers Finally Win Los Angeles a Title

May 7, 1972: The Los Angeles Lakers beat the New York Knicks, 114-100 at The Forum, outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California, in Game 5 of the NBA Finals. This gives the Lakers the series, 4 games to 1, and their 1st NBA Championship since 1954, when they were in Minneapolis.

The Lakers had lost their last Finals in Minneapolis, in 1959. They moved to Los Angeles a year later. They lost the Finals in 1962, 1963, 1965, 1966, 1968 and 1969. All 7 of these defeats were to the Boston Celtics. Then the Celtics got old, and the Lakers thought the path to a title was clear. But in 1970, they lost the Finals to the Knicks, and lost the Western Conference Finals to the Milwaukee Bucks in 1971.

So, despite having Elgin Baylor from the 1958-59 season onward, Jerry West from 1960-61 onward, Gail Goodrich from 1965-66 onward, and Wilt Chamberlain from 1968-69 onward, they lost 8 straight appearances in the NBA Finals; and failed to win a title in their 1st 11 seasons in Los Angeles.

Early in the 1971-72 season, Baylor retired. But right after that, the Lakers went on a 33-game winning streak, still the longest in the history of major league sports in North America. They won 69 regular-season games, a new NBA record that would stand for 24 years. They swept the Chicago Bulls in the 1st round of the Playoffs, then dethroned the Bucks in 6 games. The Knicks won Game 1 of the Finals, 114-92. But the Lakers took the next 4 straight: 106-92, 107-96, 116-111 in overtime, and 114-100.

The Forum

The Lakers were coached by Bill Sharman, who had played on the Celtics' dynasty. The season before, 1970-71, he had coached the Utah Stars to the title in the American Basketball Association. He and Alex Hannum were the only coaches to win the title in both the NBA and the ABA. Hannum had won the NBA with the 1967 Philadelphia 76ers, including Chamberlain; and the ABA with the 1969 Oakland Oaks.

This title also made Los Angeles the 1st city to have basketball's pro and college champions in the same calendar year, as UCLA won the NCAA Tournament. Oddly, given the Lakers' 12 NBA Championships since moving moving to Los Angeles, and the Bruins' 11 National Championships, this remains the only time it's ever happened. (UCLA won in 1965, '68, '69 and '73, but the Lakers lost in the Finals each time; the Lakers won the title in 1980, but UCLA lost the Final.) If you count Ann Arbor as part of the Detroit metropolitan area, then 1989, with the University of Michigan and the Pistons, remains the only other time it's ever been done.

The Knicks won the rubber Finals with the Lakers in 1973. After that, both teams got old. It would take the Lakers until 1980, with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Earvin "Magic" Johnson, before they reached, and won, the Finals again.

Despite baseball's Dodgers having moved from Brooklyn, and won the World Series in 1959, 1963 and 1965, the Lakers surpassed them as Los Angeles' most popular sports team. They remain so.

The Lakers would follow that 1980 title, under coach Paul Westhead, with titles in 1982, 1985, 1987 and 1988, under coach Pat Riley. Riley was a reserve on the 1972 Lakers: That's him in the photo above, wearing Number 12, and a cheesy mustache. Oddly, the Lakers have never retired his number, the way they've retired 13 for Chamberlain, 22 for Baylor, 25 for Goodrich and 44 for West, along with some later players. Chamberlain, Baylor and West were named to the NBA's 50th and 75th Anniversary Teams.

*

May 7, 1972 was a Saturday. The ABA Finals were between Games 1 and 2. The Indiana Pacers would beat the New York Nets, 4 games to 2.

Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Finals was played. The Boston Bruins beat the New York Rangers, 3-2 at Madison Square Garden. This was the 1st time any building with that name played host to the NBA and Stanley Cup Finals in the same year. It would happen again in 1994. The Bruins won the Cup in 6 games.

These games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Oakland Athletics, 7-5 at the Oakland Coliseum. Reggie Jackson went 1-for-4 with an RBI. Unfortunately, he wasn't yet playing for the Yankees. Ron Blomberg of the Yankees and Dave Duncan of the A's hit home runs.

* The New York Mets beat the San Diego Padres, 8-6 at Shea Stadium. Tommie Agee hit a home run in the bottom of the 10th inning, making Tug McGraw a winner in relief of Gary Gentry.

* The Montreal Expos beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 1-0 at Jarry Park in Montreal. The Dodgers' 1st baseman made an error in the bottom of the 13th inning, allowing Mike Jorgensen to reach base and John Boccabella to score the winning run. The 1st baseman's name was Bill Buckner.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Boston Red Sox, 8-4 at Fenway Park in Boston. Harmon Killebrew went 1-for-2 with 2 walks and 2 RBIs. Rod Carew went 2-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Carl Yastrzemski went 1-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the San Francisco Giants, 8-3 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. Greg Luzinski hit a home run. Willie Mays did not appear in the game. Four days later, the Giants traded him to the Mets.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Kansas City Royals, 5-4 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Brooks Robinson went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox, 3-0 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Milt Wilcox pitched a 3-hit shutout.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Cincinnati Reds, 9-6 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Roberto Clemente went 3-for-5 with 2 RBIs. Willie Stargell hit 2 home runs and had 5 RBIs. Pete Rose went 0-for-5. Johnny Bench went 1-for-4.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Texas Rangers, 7-4 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Al Kaline went 1-for-4 with a walk and an RBI.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Atlanta Braves, 5-4 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Lou Brock went 3-for-4 with 2 stolen bases. Hank Aaron did not play.

* The Milwaukee Brewers beat the California Angels, 5-2 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).

And in English soccer, the FA Cup Final was played at the old Wembley Stadium in West London. Cupholders Arsenal, of North London, were defeated by Yorkshire team Leeds United, 1-0, on a diving header by Allan Clarke. Arsenal had edged Leeds for the Football League title the season before, winning both the League and the Cup, for "The Double." For all their success, 1972 remains the only FA Cup won by Leeds.

May 5, 1969: Bill Russell's Last Game & Last Title

May 5, 1969: Game 7 of the NBA Finals is played at The Forum, outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California. Jack Kent Cooke, builder of The Forum, and owner of its teams, the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers and the NHL's Los Angeles Kings, has prepared the building for the Lakers' 1st World Championship since moving to Los Angeles in 1960. (They had previously won titles in Minneapolis in 1949, '50, '52, '53 and '54.) Balloons are suspended from the ceiling, in anticipation of the celebration.

There was good reason for this anticipation. The Lakers had 4 men on their roster who went on to the Basketball Hall of Fame: Guards Jerry West and Gail Goodrich, forward Elgin Baylor, and, acquired the previous off-season, center Wilt Chamberlain. Goodrich was an excellent passer. West was that, and the best shooter the game had ever seen, and a great defensive player. Baylor was the flashiest player in the league, with offensive moves no one had ever seen before.

And Chamberlain was the greatest basketball player who ever lived. The year before, with the Philadelphia 76ers, he had led the league in assists, the only time a center has ever done that. The year before that, he had led the Sixers to the NBA Championship. In each of the 7 seasons before that, he had led the NBA in scoring, including in 1961-62, when he averaged 50.4 points per game. He would be the NBA's all-time leading scorer until 1984. He is still its all-time leading rebounder. Blocked shots were not kept as an official statistic at that time; if they were, he would still be the all-time leader in that, too.

And now, he had been added to the Lakers. Before the 2003-04 Lakers, before the 2007-08 Boston Celtics, before the early 2010s Miami Heat, before the late 2010s Golden State Warriors, and before the 2020 Lakers, this was the NBA's 1st planned superteam, although that term wasn't used at the time.

The Lakers went 55-27, easily winning the regular-season title in the Western Division. In the Playoffs, they beat the San Francisco Warriors in 6 games, and then the Atlanta Hawks in 5.

Standing in their way, as they always seemed to be, were the Boston Celtics. The Celtics had won their 1st NBA Championship in 1957. In 1959 (the Lakers' last Finals appearance in Minneapolis), '62, '63, '65, '66 and '68, they had beaten the Lakers in the Finals. They had also beaten the St. Louis Hawks in the Finals in 1957, '60 and '61, losing to them in '58; and the Warriors in the Finals in '64.

Red Auerbach had coached the Celtics until the 1966 title, then stepped aside, remaining general manager. He handed the head coaching reins to the man who had been his best player since his arrival in 1956: Bill Russell. He was the 2nd-best player the game had ever seen to this point, behind Chamberlain.

But where Chamberlain was the best player, Russell was the best team player, because Auerbach built a great team around him, and Russell made them all better. He led them to another Championship in 1968, and Sports Illustrated named him their Sportsman of the Year. By 1969, that team included fellow future Hall-of-Famers Sam Jones, John Havlicek, Tom "Satch" Sanders, Bailey Howell, and, though it would be as a coach that he would be elected, Don Nelson.

Age, and the pressure of also coaching the Celtics, was catching up with Russell. The Celtics went 48-34, only finishing 4th in the Eastern Division. But it was enough to make the Playoffs, in which the Celtics beat the 76ers in 5 games, and the New York Knicks in 6.

Russell had announced he would retire as a player. Due to the aging of the Celtics -- he was 35, to Baylor's 34, Chamberlain's 32 and West's 30 -- for the 1st time, they went into an NBA Finals as an underdog. And, sure enough, the Lakers took the 1st 2 games in Inglewood, 120-118 and 118-112.

No one was really surprised when the Celtics took the next 2 at the Boston Garden, 111-105 and 89-88. Or when the Lakers won Game 5 at home, 117-104. (Due to the league having expanded to 5 additional teams over the last 3 seasons, this was the 1st NBA game ever played in the month of May.) Or when the Celtics won Game 6 at home, 99-90. There was no way Bill Russell was going to lose his last game at the Boston Garden.

But no home team had ever lost an NBA Finals Game 7. At that point, home teams were 8-0: The Rochester Royals won in 1951; the Lakers did so in 1952 and '54; the Syracuse Nationals in 1955; and the Celtics in 1957, '60, '62 and '66.

And so, for Game 7, with every good reason to believe that it would happen, Cooke ordered the balloons, yellow with "World Champion Lakers" written in purple on them, suspended from the rafters of The Forum. In every seat, and all 17,568 were filled, a flyer was placed, stating, "When, not if, the Lakers win the title, balloons will be released from the rafters, the USC marching band will play 'Happy Days Are Here Again' and broadcaster Chick Hearn will interview Elgin Baylor, Jerry West and Wilt Chamberlain in that order."

Cooke was counting his chickens before they hatched. West, trying to get through a hamstring pull in Game 5, went out for a pre-game shoot-around, and saw the balloons, and, thinking them a jinx, yelled at Cooke. Russell saw them, and walked over to West, and said, "Those fucking balloons are staying up there."

Russell told his players to take advantage of West's injury by running the fast break every chance they got. After 1 quarter, it was Celtics 24, Lakers 12. At halftime, the Lakers had cut it to 59-56. The Celtics extended their lead to 91-76 after 3.

For all his achievements, Chamberlain would later say that he was most proud of the fact that he had never fouled out of a game in his career. But early in the 4th quarter, he was assessed his 5th foul. With only 1 more to give, he had to take it easy on defense. With 5 minutes left, and the Celtics leading 103-94, he injured his knee, and walked to the bench.

Laker coach Butch van Breda Kolff, who had coached a Princeton University team featuring later New York Knicks star Bill Bradley to the NCAA Final Four in 1965, sent backup center Mel Counts in -- and with 2 minutes left, it was Boston 103, Los Angeles 102.

Chamberlain told van Breda Kolff he was ready to go back in. VBK said, "We're doing fine without you."

They were not doing fine without him: They were still behind. And so, in the most important two minutes of his coaching career, down by one point, Butch van Breda Kolff left the greatest player of all time on the bench. It remains the greatest coaching blunder in the history of the NBA.

With 1:33 left, it was still 103-102 Boston, when Havlicek, famous for a key steal at the end of Game 7 of the 1965 Eastern Conference Finals, against a 76ers team with Chamberlain, had the ball knocked away from him by Keith Erickson. This looked like a big break for the Lakers. Instead, it went to Nelson, who beat the 24-second shot clock with a shot from 18 feet out, to make it 105-102 Celtics.

The Lakers would follow this with turnovers that might not have happened if Chamberlain had been put back in. The game ended Celtics 108, Lakers 106. Two points made the difference between the Lakers finally winning their 1st NBA Championship in Los Angeles, and letting the balloons come down, and the most humiliating defeat in NBA history.

For the Celtics, Russell used only 7 players, all game long: Havlicek scored 26, Jones 24, Em Bryant 20, Nelson 16, Howell 9, Larry Siegfried 7, and Russell himself 6 plus 21 rebounds.

The Lakers also used only 7 players: West scored 42, with 13 rebounds and 12 assists, making him the 1st player with a triple-double in an NBA Finals Game 7 (through the 2021 Finals, he has been followed only by James Worthy in 1988 and LeBron James in 2016); Baylor 20, with 15 rebounds; Chamberlain 18, with 27 rebounds, despite missing the last 5 minutes; Counts and Johnny Egan each scored 9, Erickson 6, and Tom Hawkins 2.

For the 1st time, a Most Valuable Player award was presented for the Finals. It was given to West. He remains the only player from a losing team ever to receive it. In 2009, the award was renamed the Bill Russell Award, honoring a man who never had it available to him, but had played 13 seasons in the NBA, made 12 Finals, and won 11 Championships.

Jerry West

Cooke correctly identified the scapegoat, and fired van Breda Kolff almost immediately. VBK went on to coach in the NBA with Detroit, Phoenix and New Orleans (the Jazz, not the Hornets/Pelicans franchise); in the ABA with Memphis; and in college with the University of New Orleans, Lafayette and Hofstra. He never got close to winning again. Chamberlain (and West) had carried him, so maybe he should have given Chamberlain the benefit of the doubt.

Russell went on to coach 4 seasons with the Seattle SuperSonics, and 1 for the Sacramento Kings. Like many player-coaches, he found it a lot harder to coach when he couldn't call on himself to play. Without himself (and Auerbach to build teams for him), he coached 5 seasons, losing in the 1st round of the Playoffs twice, missing twice, and being fired before he could complete his season in Sacramento.

The Lakers got back to the Finals in 1970, and lost to the Knicks, and they remain the only team ever to lose 3 straight NBA Finals. Early in the 1971-72 season, Baylor retired. In their next game, the Lakers began a 33-game winning streak, still a record for North American major league sports. They set a new record with 69 regular-season wins, breaking the record of 68 by the 1967 76ers, who also had Chamberlain. They beat the Knicks in the Finals, breaking a 13-year, 0-8 Finals drought. That Finals was won in Game 5, at The Forum. There were no balloons. The Lakers faced the Knicks in the Finals again the next year, and lost. Chamberlain retired after that, and West after 1 more year.

The Celtics rebuilt, and won titles in 1974 and 1976. Both teams rebuilt, and the Celtics, with Russell not involved by Auerbach, who was still team president, won titles in 1981, '84 (beating the Lakers in the Finals) and '86; while the Lakers, with Cooke having sold the team and the arena to Jerry Buss, and West as general manager, won them in 1980, '82, '85 (beating the Celtics in the Finals), '87 (beating the Celtics again) and '88.

Both teams rebuilt again, but the Celtics couldn't get it done, while watching the Lakers, under West's building and Phil Jackson's coaching, win again in 2000, '01 and '02. Another rebuilding job led the Celtics to win the Finals over the Lakers in 2008, but the Lakers won in 2009, and beat the Celtics in 2010. The Lakers have since won again, in 2020, while the Celtics are still looking for their 1st title since 2008. 

The 2 franchises share the record: Each team has won 17 NBA Championships. But if you only count what they've won in their respective current cities (and you should), it's Boston 17, Los Angeles 12.

Going into the 2021-22 Playoffs, home teams are now 15-4 in NBA Finals Game 7s. Since the 1969 Lakers, the only losers have been the 1974 Milwaukee Bucks to the Celtics, the 1978 Seattle SuperSonics to the Washington Bullets, and the 2016 Golden State Warriors to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

(UPDATE: The Celtics won again in 2024, making the count Celtics 18, Lakers 17.)

*

May 5, 1969 was a Monday. That same night, Game 4 of the American Basketball Association Finals was played, and the Oakland Oaks beat the Indiana Pacers, 144-117 at the Indiana State Fair Coliseum (now the Corteva Coliseum) in Indianapolis. The Oaks wrapped up the title 2 nights later at the Oakland Coliseum Arena, winning 135-131.

The NHL season had ended the night before, as the Montreal Canadiens completed a 4-game sweep of the St. Louis Blues, 2-1 at the St. Louis Arena, to win their 2nd straight Stanley Cup, their 4th Cup in the last 5 years, and their 8th in the last 14.

Football was out of season. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Oakland Athletics, 3-2 at the Oakland Coliseum. Chuck Dobson outpitched Mel Stottlemyre, future Yankee Danny Cater hit a home run, and Reggie Jackson, not quite 23 years old and in his 2nd full MLB season, went 2-for-3 with a walk.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Montreal Expos, 8-5 at Jarry Park in Montreal, in a game shortened to 7 innings due to rain. Lee May and Bobby Tolan hit home runs for the Reds, Pete Rose went 2-for-3 with a walk and scored 3 runs, while Johnny Bench went 0-for-2 with 2 walks.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Baltimore Orioles, 4-2 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Frank Robinson went 2-for-3, but Brooks Robinson went 0-for-3, and Dick Hall blew a save in the 9th inning.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 13-3 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Andy Kosco hit 2 home runs for the Dodgers, while Willie Stargell went 1-for-3 for the Pirates, and Roberto Clemente did not play.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Detroit Tigers, 6-2 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit. For the Twins, Harmon Killebrew hit a home run, and Rod Carew had an RBI single. For the Tigers, Jim Northrup hit a home run, and Al Kaline went 1-for-3.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the Chicago Cubs, 11-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. They did this without Willie Mays entering the game. Ernie Banks only appeared as an unsuccessful pinch-hitter.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the San Diego Padres, 7-6 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the California Angels, 7-2 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim.)

* And the Seattle Pilots beat the Washington Senators, 2-0 at Sick's Stadium in Seattle. Rich Rollins singled home a run in the 1st inning, and Steve Whitaker did the same in the 4th.

In Ball Four, his memoir of that season, Pilots pitcher Jim Bouton wrote:

The meeting before the game was marvelous. When we went over the hitters, Gary Bell had the same comment on each one: "Smoke him inside" (fastball inside). Frank Howard, (Ken) McMullen, (Ed) Brinkman, (Mike) Epstein -- every hitter. "Smoke him inside," said Bell. It got to be funny as hell after a while, because not only did he get no opposition, but he was taken seriously. According to the gospel of Gary Bell you pitch to the entire Washington team by smoking them inside.

Marshall, an intellectual, and thus one of Bouton's favorite teammates, pitched a 2-hit shutout against that dangerous lineup managed by former Red Sox legend Ted Williams, the man who, literally, wrote the book on hitting: The Science of Hitting, like Ball Four, was published the following year. Bouton wrote, "I guess Mike Marshall smoked them on the inside."

* And the New York Mets and the Atlanta Braves, and the Chicago White Sox and the Cleveland Indians, were not scheduled to play.

And Hideki Irabu, the Japanese pitcher who briefly shone for the Yankees, was born.