Olmps

Why Watch Basketball?

Why watch basketball? Why ever not? In fact, if you

have got tickets and are in two minds about going, call us and we’ll work something out.. For those lucky enough to be attending, expect something amazing.. On the basketball court, human beings almost fly: the best can hang in the air, seemingly making split seconds expand to create time in which to move the ball between their hands before shooting..

If the game’s vertical dimension inspires awe, its horizontal axis releases adrenaline, even if you’re only watching on TV.. Basketball is a game of incessant flow and action that demands complex and high-speed teamwork as well as moments of individual genius.. In the tight spaces of the basketball court, inspiration, spontane- ity and trickery are constant, as players, unable to barge or push, must seek out space, throw no-look passes, steal the ball, turn and switch direction in an instant..

The rules require teams to shoot at the basket at least every 24 seconds..This creates a pulsating ebb and flow of advantage and disadvantage, and huge scores too – often over 100 points on each side (the last Olympic final finished 118-107)..There may not be much midfield, but every game is a blizzard of action, punctuated with jump shots and the high-energy surges of players hard-driv- ing to the net..And all of this in an arena where the crowd is closer to the benches and the action than in any other.. Still want to sell those tickets?

The Story of Basketball

By the closing years of the nineteenth century the

YMCA had established a network of sports halls and gymnasiums all over Europe and North America.. However, in the United States it was rapidly losing members to the great outdoor sports of the era

– American football and baseball – while its commitment to gymnastics was proving a little too rigorous for the youth of America.. It was in this context that Luther Gulick, head of the training

school for YMCA instructors in Springfield, Massachusetts, encouraged his students and staff to develop indoor games that could bring the punters back to theYMCA’s ‘halls of health’..

James Naismith, a thirty-year-old Canadian, was one of those students, and after considering and rejecting variants of American football, soccer and lacrosse, he formulated a 13-rule game that would soon become basketball. .The first recorded game was played nine-a-side in December 1891, with a peach basket nailed to the rafters as the goal.. It was an instant hit, and over the next decade Springfield’s instructors did such a good job of promoting the new sport that it was soon second only to baseball in terms of national participation. .The rules were quickly and systematically adapted – nine-a-side quickly became five-a-side, the basket was replaced by a backboard and a net, regulations on fouls and free throws were introduced – but it was still essentially the same basic no-contact game of passing, dribbling and shooting that Naismith had invented..

Thereafter, the game grew through two different channels.. In the USA, the school and college sport was accompanied by the emergence of a huge urban basketball culture, especially amongst the ethnic enclaves of America’s great industrial cities, and by a growing circuit of professional leagues and exhibition matches. . These somewhat chaotic leagues, which featured roughhouse play and courts surrounded by wire mesh, eventually coalesced to form

the National Basketball Association (NBA) in 1949..

In the rest of the world, basketball arrived via the YMCA or the American army, or both. . In urban gyms and sports clubs in the Mediterranean, Eastern Europe,Australia, Japan, the Philippines and China, basketball took hold as an immensely popular recreational game. . However, it never acquired elite professional status, and the communist nations (China has an estimated 30 million players) could challenge only at American college level. . Meanwhile, the NBA – the apex of global basketball – remained in a league of its own..

The readmission of professionals into the Olympics in 1992 brought these worlds back together, to an extent. .While the Americans remain the dominant force in both men’s and women’s

basketball, the professionalisation of the game in Europe and China and the flow of talent from overseas into the NBA have made the Olympic contest rather more equal..

Game On: Basketball Basics

Scoring: 3-2-1

The aim of the game is to score more points than the

opposing team..This is done by putting the ball through the net that they are defending. .The number of points scored depends on where the ball was released.. If it was thrown from outside the 6..25m line (a long basket), it’s a 3-pointer.. More common is the 2-point field goal, scored from open play inside the line.. Finally, a free throw, taken unimpeded from the free throw or foul line in front of the basket, scores 1 point..

Time In, Time Out

The game is five-a-side. Each team has another seven

players on the bench and substitutions are unlimited..Though the starting five on a team are generally the strongest unit and play the most minutes, it is virtually unheard for anyone to play a complete match..At the Olympics, the game is played in four quarters, each ten minutes long, with a half-time interval of fifteen minutes.. In the event of a tied score at the end of the fourth quarter five minutes of overtime are played.. Coaches can call a one-minute time out, during which play is suspended, once in each of the first three quarters, twice in the fourth quarter and once in overtime..

Moving and dribbling

Players can throw, bounce, roll and pat the ball, but

they must not kick or punch it..They are allowed to take three steps with the ball but must then shoot or pass.. If they bounce the ball, one handed, they can dribble an unlimited distance with the ball.. If the ball goes over the sidelines, the last team to touch it loses possession.. Their opponents then have five seconds to get

the ball to the place where it passed out of play and five seconds to release it..

Fouling Up

Basketball is, theoretically, a non-contact sport.

Players are not allowed to impede the movement of their opponents with their arms, elbows or hips, nor are they allowed to grab, charge, barge or trip them.. However, there is a great deal of hidden contact and the officiating can be rather uneven..

Fouls committed by a team result in possession passing to the opposition. . If the foul was committed on a player in the act of shooting, a free throw (see diagram above) is given.. If the team has already accumulated four team fouls in a quarter then any additional foul results in two free throws for their opponents.. Players also have fouls counted against them individually. .When they reach five personal fouls they are excluded from the game (though they can be subbed)..Technical fouls are also awarded for acts of violence and unsportsmanlike behaviour..

No Goal hanging, No Goaltending

Basketball has developed a series of rules to ensure that

the balance between attack and defence is maintained..To prevent goal hanging, the coloured rectangle in front of the basket – referred to as the paint or the key – is designated a restricted area.. Attacking players can spend no longer than three seconds inside it.. Another flaw in the old basketball rules was that a very tall player could stand close to the basket and swat everything away..To prevent this kind of goaltending, players are not allowed to block shots on the downward element of their arc nor are defensive players allowed to try to gain an offensive foul from their opponents inside the small arc drawn 1..25m in front of the basket..This prevents defenders from simply impeding players who are driving towards the basket..

The Shot Clock

One tactic that teams used to employ was to play

keep-ball,thereby wasting time and grinding down the opposition; effective perhaps, but terminally dull. .To prevent this, the NBA introduced the shot clock, which is usually positioned above the backboards and on the scoreboard.. Once a team takes possession they have 8 seconds to get the ball into the opponents’ half and 24 seconds to make an attempt on goal. . Failure to do either results in possession passing to the other side..

The Finer Points

The Shot Locker: Jump, fade, Spin and layup

The bread and butter of basketball is the jump shot. A

player leaps into the air and at the high point of the jump launches the ball in an arc towards the basket, over the hands of jumping defenders.. Look out for variations that give players a little more space or time in which to make the shot.. Playing with their back to the basket, players often leap and spin through 180 degrees before shooting.. This can be combined with a fade, in which a player jumps up and drifts backwards away from the defender.. Closer to the basket, players

use the layup..As they leap, the ball is sent vertically up towards the backboard and spin imparted by the fingers makes it drop directly into the net or bounce off the backboard and through the hoop..

The Dunk

The most spectacular score is the dunk,some-

times known as the slam dunk, in which the player drops or pushes the ball through the hoop from

above the rim. . Even in

its most basic versions it is an extraordinary display of athletic power and strength, often completed with the most emphatic of flourishes, leaving a player swinging from the edge of

the hoop..This play wasn’t envisaged as an aspect of the game that Naismith devised and the American college game banned it for a decade.. However, it’s been a staple of the modern sport, especially since it became the preserve of giants (the famous 1992 USA Dream Team had only one player under 6ft 6in).. For converse reasons, the slam dunk remains rare in the women’s game..

Most dunks come from a drive by a player towards the hoop and a massive leap, but look out for a high ball passed above the hoop, caught by a player in flight, and slammed into the net: this is the ally-oop.. Most spectacular of all, a leap combined with a spin produces the overhead reverse dunk.. Dunks can, on occasion, muster enough power to break the whole structure holding up the basket or shatter the glass backboard..

the attacking team will move so as to put himself between the two, sometimes called setting a screen..At this point the defender has a choice: if they continue to mark the ball carrier, the screen setter can pivot and roll around them into space to receive the ball; if the defender goes with the screen setter then the ball carrier is suddenly in space to shoot or make a decisive pass – the pick and pop..

Basketball Goes to the Olympics

Just thirteen years after being invented, basketball

appeared as a demonstration sport at the 1904 St Louis Games. . There were collegiate, YMCA and schools tournaments, plus an amateur six-squad competition that was the closest thing to an Olympic contest. . It was won by the Buffalo German YMCA from upstate NewYork.. In the years before the First World War the Buffalo team, like all of the early semi-professional barnstorming squads, was permanently on the road, and racked up a 111-game winning streak..

The global network of YMCAs was spreading the game to the cities of East Asia, Latin America and Europe, and at Paris 1924 it was recalled as a demonstration sport.. Basketball didn’t make it as a full sport, however, until Berlin 1936.. By this time it had acquired a global ruling body (FIBA), a whole raft of professional American leagues and a place in the sporting cultures of dozens of countries.. James Naismith himself came to present the medals in Berlin, but the event hardly showed the sport in its best light, as matches were played outside on a tennis court that had been packed hard with sand and clay..The final, played in wet and windy conditions that made dribbling impossible, was particularly dismal..The USA beat Canada 19-8..

The London Games of 1948 were held indoors and the USA, now able to play the game properly, showed the world how it was done.. In the official report it was noted that the Americans possessed ‘the agility of bantams’, and that ‘as soon as these giants entered the arena, opposing teams seemed to wilt and fade away’.. In the final they thrashed France 65-21..

Helsinki 1952 saw the arrival of the Soviet Union and ColdWar politics..The Soviets went all the way to the final, where, in a dour and mean-spirited game, they tried to play keep-ball; the Americans beat them anyway, 36-25..A rather more spirited approach to the game was taken by the Uruguayans.. In their game against France they had lost so many players to personal fouls that they played the final minutes of the game with just three on the court..When the referee called a further foul against them he was rushed by the bench; two Uruguayans were eventually banned from the Games as a result..Things were little better the next day, when a game between a four-man Uruguay and three-man Argentina culminated in a massive on-court brawl..

In Melbourne in 1956 the USSR team arrived with Jan Kru- minsh, a 7ft 3in Latvian centre, but the Americans, including the great Bill Russell (five-time winner of the NBA Most Valuable Player Award), ran rings around them and everyone else, beating the USSR 89-55 in the final.. Rome,Tokyo and Mexico City all went the same way, though theYugoslavs and Soviets were getting closer..

In 1972, at the Munich Games, the gap finally closed. .The USSR led the USA for almost the whole of the final game, but with three seconds to go American Doug Collins was bundled out of the court and the US was awarded two free throws.. Looking battered but composed, Collins sunk them both and for the first time the USA was in the lead, 50-49..The Soviets restarted, a long ball went nowhere, the buzzer went and the Americans exploded with joy and relief..Then chaos erupted on the court when one of the officials claimed a time out had been called with one second left on the clock..The game was restarted and the Soviets again failed to score, only for the officials to insist that a third restart was required but with three seconds rather than one second on the clock. .At the third attempt the Soviets launched a huge court-length pass to Sasha Belov whose simple layup made it 51-50..The Americans refused to show for the medal ceremony..

Over the next four Games, the Cold War pendulum swung back and forth.. In Montreal in 1976 the Americans were denied a full measure of revenge when the Yugoslavs knocked the Soviets out in the semi-final..The USSR did, however, win