The first NBA champion, but not exactly

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In 2021, basketball celebrated its 130th birthday. As is well known, PE teacher James Naismith started this great game, which to this day is one of the most interesting sports on the planet. And in the US it is a religion.

Professional basketball dates back to the late 19th century, but the formed US professional league only played for 6 seasons and then folded. However, the college championship gained popularity in the early years of the 20th century and, thanks to the interest in the championship, another attempt was made at a professional league, which lasted from 1938 to 1949. However, the National Basketball League is not the "mother of the NBA" - it is the American Basketball Association, which existed from 1947 to 1949, when the National Basketball Association was finally formed.

Although the official name NBA came in 1949, the three seasons of the BAA are considered the beginning of the current strongest league on the planet. Therefore, the 1946/47 season is considered the first campaign in the championship.

It featured 11 teams, played 60 games, and crowned the league's first champion, the Philadelphia Warriors, nowadays the Golden State Warriors.

In the regular season, the team from Pennsylvania is not in particularly good shape. Eddie Gottlieb's alumni remain in 2nd place in their conference, with the Washington Capitals becoming the Eastern regular season champions. Already in the first round of the playoffs, the Phillies have trouble, barely overcoming St. Louis 2:1 in the series, and in the decisive game #3, the star of the team, Joe Fulks, scores 24 points in the victory with 75: 59.

In the semi-final phase, Philadelphia meets the New York Knicks, who finished just 2 wins behind Philly in the regular season. However, the dominance of the "Warriors" is definite, and Fulks played 2 fantastic games to lead his team to two consecutive victories - 82:70 at home and 72:53 away in the Big Apple. Thus, the "Warriors" reached the dream final, and Fulks scored 40 points in the two games.

The champions of the two different conferences then played each other to determine the first finalist, with the Washington Capitals surprisingly being swept by the Chicago Stags 4-2 in the series, putting the Windy City as favorites against Philadelphia in the final.

However, the final series is surprisingly one-sided - Philadelphia runs over its opponent 4:1 in the series. Game 1 in Chicago is decisive as the Warriors take a 2-0 series lead behind strong games from Joe Fulks and Howie Dallmar. In game #3, Philly won very hard with 75:72, thanks to 26 points from Fuls. Chicago reduced the score to 3:1 after success by 1 point difference (74:73), but in the next game, Philadelphia again snatched the victory from under Chicago's nose with 83:30, and Fulks scored a staggering 34 points - a championship for the Philadelphia Warriors.

Fulks finished the season as the only player on Philly's team to record a 30% shooting percentage, while also averaging 23.2 points per game (average statistics were not kept then, but they are known today). He also became the first scoring champion in NBA history (although the league wasn't called that at the time).

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