Leisure Kicks - The essencial sport and leisure guide

Although basketball is widely regarded as an all American sport, it was actually a Canadian called James Naismith who invented it in 1891 as a way to keep rowdy kids off the streets and out of the winter cold in Springfield, Massachusetts. He originally tried to bring the games of soccer and lacrosse indoors, but these games didn’t transfer well to the YMCA gym. The first hoops were made from old peach baskets, which meant the ball had to be retrieved after each ‘basket’ with a broom handle. The ball was originally brown; it only became the now symbolic orange colour in the 1950s to make it easier for spectators to follow the ball. Naismith also came up with the essential 13 rules of the game, which have by and large endured over the years.

Naismith lived to see the sport grow into an incredible worldwide sporting phenomenon – albeit not as extreme as what exists today. He even got to see the sport’s Olympic debut at the 1936 Game in Berlin.

Current trends are taking basketball back to its urban roots, with new courts springing up in housing estates and disused areas in an effort to engage disadvantaged young people. Some of Britain’s top basketball players got into the game in just this same way. 

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A basketball practice in 1925
Wikimedia Commons