Old School Audio: Osh Kosh vs Sheboygan, March 1946

Before the Basketball Association of America tipped off in the fall of 1946, the National Basketball League was the most prominent basketball league in the United States. The NBL was formed in 1937, and continued to operate until it merged with the BAA in 1949 to form the NBA.

Audio and video footage from NBL and BAA games is rare, and I recently discovered the following audio from a March 17, 1946 game between the NBL's Osh Kosh All-Stars and Sheboygan Red Skins on the Association of Professional Basketball Research message boards. According to the poster, Brian Gaynor:

This transmission puts the listener inside the Sheboygan Municipal Auditorium and Armory on a Sunday afternoon in March 1946. Gametime was usually 3 p.m. for Sunday afternoon tussles, allowing for games to end around dinner time -- in time for the gang to head to the Chicken Tavern, the hangout for the Red Skins, their fans and their opponents. The tavern was only two blocks from the train station and a convenient launching-off point for Red Skins foes.

The Sheboygan Municipal Auditorium and Armory

Home of the Red Skins

Photo by "self"

[CC-BY-SA-2.5], via Wikimedia Commons

Gaynor also mentions how this game highlights the travel challenges of the day

The teams played Saturday night at 8:30 in Oshkosh, then turned around and played at 3 p.m. Sunday in Sheboygan. So the teams played the game, showered, drove to Sheboygan (at night or in the morning), slept, had some lunch and immediately got ready for the next day's game. That sort of scant turnaround time would never happen today, of course. 

Listen for highlights of the All-Stars' Bob Carpenter, who led the NBL in scoring during the 1945-46 season with 13.9 points per game. The audio was originally posted here.

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