1. THE FIRST BASKETBALL WASN’T.
It was a soccer egg .
2. THE MORE THE MERRIER.
Nowhere in the original rules is the telephone number of player per side determine . Naismith , who had been postulate to invent an indoor winter activity by his knob at a YMCA in Springfield , Massachusetts , need a plot adaptable enough to admit whoever wanted to play . For a while the crowd on the royal court was a default 18 , nine per side , because that ’s how many register up for the first plot . In 1897 , though , the start five was validate , and substitution allow . But it was n’t until 1920 that a replaced crank could riposte to a game — just once — and not until 1945 that limitless substitutions became the principle .
3. NO DRIBBLING ALLOWED.
In the kickoff , a player could not advance the ball himself . Rather , he had to throw it from wherever he captivate it . The first team credited with make headway the bollock by drivel it represent at Yale in 1897 . ( The same Yale that made this year ’s NCAA Tournament , for the first time since 1962 . ) Leave it to Ivy Leaguers to re - interpret the passing rule to include a bounce cash in one’s chips to a player himself . Official valuation account for the dribble — just one per self-will ab initio — were take on four years afterward .
4. NO HARM, NO FOUL.
shoulder , property , drive , tripping , or otherwise strike an opponent was never hunky-dory . But such offenses were n’t recorded as personal foul until 1910 , with the advent of a rule disqualifying a player for pull four of them . That totality was raised to five in 1946 , in the inaugural rule of the Basketball Association of America ( the original name of the National Basketball Association ) , and to six the next year .
5. “BASKET BALL” WAS NOT A EUPHEMISM.
The original verbal description of what constitute a goal—“when the ball is fuddle or batted from the grounds into the hoop and delay there”—held until 1913 , when undefended - ended earnings replaced shut , wind cast - iron rim ( which had replaced peach basketful in the mid-1890s ) .
6. IT WAS ALMOST TACKLE BASKETBALL.
When the clump landed out of bounds , possession was determined by throw it down Margaret Court and picture which squad match it first . That ’s one seam Naismith did n’t quite think through ; scrambles to be first to the Lucille Ball result in seriously injurious confrontation . Thus , the rule modification in 1913 , give the ball to whichever team had n’t allude it last .
7. EARLY REFEREES NEEDED WATCHES.
That ’s because one of the official duties of other ref was timekeeping . Then again , there was n’t that much time to keep : the 24 - second jibe clock was n’t instituted until 1954 , to combat stalling tactics NBA teams had begun to engage .
8. THE ORIGINAL GAME WAS BRIEF.
Naismith envisioned two 15 - minute halves , with five minutes ’ sleep between . When the BAA was formed in 1946 , the two halves were rejiggered as four quarters of 12 minutes each to give fans more ball for their Pearl Buck .
9. NOW THAT’S AN IDEA: OVERTIME BY CONSENSUS!
In the pillow slip of a tie , Naismith stipulated that the game could be stay on “ by correspondence of the skipper ” until one more goal was made .
It was n’t until the sixties that such sudden death gave way to a five - minute overtime period .
On the Origins of Sports : The former History and Original Rules of Everybody ’s Favorite Games(Artisan ) hail out April 19th .
