Who knew basketball would evolve into this? It just may be the greatest event in sports history.
It all started when the game was invented way back in 1891 in Springfield, Massachusetts, by the one and only Dr. James Naismith. Its crazy to think that girls started to play only one year after the game was invented. Women were ready to take on this sport, but were men ready to accept that women were just as good as them? Although most people looked at basketball as a male dominated sport, women have proved them wrong. Basketball was invented in 1891, womens basketball started less than a year later. A gymnastics instructor, Senda Bernson Abbott, adapted Dr.James Naismith’s basketball rules and introduced the game at Smith College. The first
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The first association put together was the formation of Women’s Basketball Rules Committee in 1899. In 1923 the formation of the Women’s Division of the National Amateure Athletic Federation (NAAF) was put into play. The next association to be put together was not until a while after 1923. The Women 's Sports Foundation formed in 1974. Women’s Professional Basketball league was finally formed in 1978. Women were ready and excited to show that they can play just as well as guys. Women’s Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) wasn 't formed until 1981. In 1991 the Liberty Basketball Association was launched, but after one exhibition game it folded. Then in 1997 the inaugural season of the Women’s National Basketball Association(WNBA) was kicked off to a good …show more content…
One of the many was in 1926 when the Amaure Athletic Union sponsered the first ever National Women’s Basketball Championship using men’s rules. In 1976 women’s basketball makes its Olympic debut. Two important events happened in the same year in April and the other in October. On April 24, 1996 the National Basketball Association board of governors approved of the Women’s Basketball Association concept. Then on October,18 1996 the American Basketball Leagues (ABL) tipped off its first season with eight teams. A very important event took place in 1999, the Women’s Hall of Fame opened in Knoxville,
In 1995, some legendary tennis players such as Martina Navarotilova, Chris Avert, founded Women's Sports Legends Foundation. In 1997, seven more players joined this group with several common goals of marketing themselves as ambassadors for women and sports. They pooled their resources and called on their individual talents as players, teachers, entertainers and leaders.
Later in the century, the first women’s softball team was formed in 1895 at Chicago’s West Division High School. The team did not receive a coach for competitive play until 1899. At that time it was very difficult to develop interest among fans. About five years later women’s softball received more attention when “The Spalding Indoor Baseball Guide devoted a large section of the guide to the game of women’s softball (Cohen 52).” In 1933, the Chicago National Tournament also advanced the sport. At this competition, the male and female champions were honored equally. Also in 1933, “the Amateur Softball Association (ASA) was founded to govern and promote softball in the United States (World Book).” The ASA set up a committee that established one set of rules now used by teams in all parts of the world.
When female athletes wanted to participate in tournaments and intercollegiate play they had to form their own league, since the NCAA would not accept women's teams. Many women fought long and hard in order to form the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) in 1972, and even harder to make it the successful league it eventually became. The AIAW gained corporate sponsors and television coverage of their national championship and also catapulted women's basketball into the forefront of athletics worldwide. In 1976, just four years after the formation of the AIAW, women's basketball debuted at the Olympics. At the end of its reign the AIAW had created 42 national championships and moved from a 276 charter member institution into an organization consisting of 971 institutional members (Hult).
Women have been playing basketball for over a century before the Women's National Basketball Association came into existence. It was here at Smith College where many women got their first taste of the game. Women were described as having a "masculine performance style... rough and vicious play... worse than in men" (Hult 86). This aggressive playing style had to be modified because the violence and rough-housing that was going on were becoming intolerable. Eventually the Official Women's Basketball Rules were modified in that there was no dribbling allowed on the court at all, players were not allowed to make physical contact with each other and women were not allowed to grab the ball out of another women's hands.
The NBA was created in 1946, and in 1976 it merged with the ABA to become the premier league in America. The League has expanded over the years and now consists of 29 teams in the United States and one team in Canada, with each team playing 82 games per season
To understand the significance of the league (which will further be referred to as the AAGPBL) you must first have an understanding of the role of women in society at this time. Post World War II, women had a very slight role in anything not concerning domestic issues. Public figures and decision-makers were male, and very few women were involved in anything having to with business or politics. Women were expected to be ladylike and well mannered at all times. Because of these factors it was rare to find a woman involved in any type of sport, especially those dominated by males.
Backstory of Basketball Basketball has been played since 1891, and still continues to be played today as well. Basketball is an intriguing game played by 2 teams with 5 players from each team on the court at the same time. Basketball, as it started out in 1891 had no African American athletes in the sport. That was still going on, even as late as the 1950’s.
The announcement of the WNBA came with mixed regards. There were those who thought that it took the United States long enough, and there were those who did not understand the point of having a professional women's basketball team. I find myself to this day defending the ideas many have about women's basketball - collegiate and otherwise. The regular comments are: 'It's too slow!' 'The scores are so low!' 'There's nothing to watch!' 'They don't dunk!' All the silly ignorant comments. My male cousin still refuses to even watch a game; he just doesn't see the point. My sentiments were more in regard to the amount it took for the WNBA to be formed. As a young basketball player I shared the dream of becoming the first woman in the NBA. (There had to be some goal!) Although those before me, possessing the greater talent were not able to do it, perhaps they were simply paving the way for me. I continued with the basketball camps, the leagues, and the school teams. I was eventually astonished to learn that there actually existed a Professional Women's basketball league. The only problem was that it was an ocean and a couple time zones away. I did not unders...
Basketball has been around for a long while. It was first established in 1891 by James Naismith. James Naismith was once the basketball coach at Kansas University. When he invented the sport he used a peach basket as the goal. When it first originated every time they would score they’d be required to call the janitor out with a ladder to get the ball down. After a few months they cut the bottoms of the basket out.
Women's National Basketball Association came to be years after the NBA; National Basketball Association, both similar and different in there own ways. After decades of debating whether to have woman playing basketball, in 1996 it came to be. Los Angeles hosted the first official game; “The first WNBA game featured the New York Liberty facing the Los Angeles Sparks in Los Angeles. The game was televised nationally in the United States on the NBC television network.” (History, League Founded and Play Begins) But although, the WNBA was a big step for basketball professional women players it still has set regulations, comparisons to the NBA, and a bigger purpose then just
Women are being allowed to participate now, including professional leagues such as the Women’s National Basketball Association, and the Ladies Professional Golf Association. Women in sports, especially softball and basketball, have become a big-time business. World War II is when the basis of women’s professional sports began. While the men were overseas fighting the war against the Nazis and Germans, the women entertained the people who stayed back by playing baseball.
Basketball was created as a sport in 1891 by James Naismith, and it quickly became popular among both men and women. It initially started with the same rules for each gender, but according to Patricia Cain in her article, “Women, Race, and Sports: Life Before Title IX,” the rules quickly changed for women. Cain (2001) states that, “Almost immediately, however, some educators began changing the rules of basket...
Way more television sources support and cover the NBA than they do the WNBA. With the money that the NBA gets paid just so these sports reporters can run their stories, they can afford to pay their players more. The WNBA only gets covered by ABC, ESPN2, NBA TV, Lifetime, Oxygen, and NBC, and these stations only run their stories for about 5 minutes where to the NBA they talk about them for hours. When the games are going on you can only view the WNBA regular season games on ESPN, and NBA TV and their finals on ABC (McCullick, 2012), where you can view the NBA regular season games on ESPN, ABC, CBS, NBC, TNT, TBS, and NBA TV (NBA). Even if we could get more sponsors to support the WNBA and more support from the minority community since they are the ones who show the most interest in basketball maybe these women could get a raise in their checks and would not have to have side jobs on the side to live, when their dreams and hard work is not paying them what they deserve to get paid. Half of these women on the court can play basketball just as well as the majority of the men on the court, the only difference that they may have is that the men are more capable of dunking than the women but that does not mean that women cannot do it, because WNBA 's own Candace Parker as known as the female Kevin Durant has proved to everyone that a women can dunk a basketball on multiple occasions during a
Women basketball players aren’t paid as well as men players. As of the year 2013 women teams, can’t exceed nine hundred thirteen thousand. In the year 2013 Kobe Bryant made thirty million. A rookie NBA player makes four times as
Although many sports are not considered American-made, basketball is one of the few that began in America. In fact it is the only major sport that can be considered American-made (Encyclopedia.com, Basketball). The inventor of basketball was Dr. James Naismith, who created the sport in 1891(History.com Staff, NBA is Born). This was all the way back when there were only forty-four states(nbahoopsonline.com, NBA History). He made the sport in Springfield, Massachusetts(History.com Staff, NBA is Born). Naismith invented this sport because he was P.E. teacher seeking a sport with limited physical contact, but it contained running, jumping, shooting, and hand-eye coordination(Encyclopedia.com, Basketball). The game first used peach baskets and a soccer like ball(History.com Staff,