A Wild Day in the NBA

   February 15, 1970 was no ordinary Sunday in the National Basketball Association. Five league games were played on that Sunday many years ago. The Philadelphia '76ers led by Jim Washington scored a monster 159-125 win over the Phoenix Suns. Washington led the '76ers with a game high 34 points. The '76ers also used a 47 point fourth quater to put the game out of reach, this gave them an 85 point second half. The two clubs combined to score an amazing 89 points in the fourth quarter at the Spectrum in Philadelphia. The '76ers 36 point first quarter was their weakest quarter of the game.

  In that the facts of the game at Philadelphia were impressive to say the least, the '76ers were not the only league club to score a 47 point performance in their final quarter. The San Diego Rockets duplicated the feat in their game against the Cincinnati Royals at the San Diego Sports Arena. The Rockets used an 88 point second half performance, 36 points by Stu Lantz and 31 points by Elvin Hayes to beat the Royals 150-123. The Royals even outscored the Rockets in the second quarter and matched them in the third quarter with 41 points.

  If these two games were not enough scoring for you, then at Atlanta there was the Hawks 146-125 win over the Boston Celtics. The Hawks were lead by Lou Hudson who scored 36 points. The Hawks however scored only 31 points in the final quarter in joining the Rockets and the '76ers as big winners in the night.

  The biggest individual scorer of the night, did not appear in any of these games. Dave Bing of the Detriot Pistons led his team to a 126-119 win over the Chicago Bulls, with 38 points. The Pistons team total was good enough to take fourth place on the night and would have barely beaten out the forementioned losers of the night. There was however, a game that night where neither team even cracked a 100 points. The Los Angeles Lakers led by the great Jerry West scored a 98-96 win over the Milwaukee Bucks in Milwaukee. The Bucks were handicapped by a league low 18 points in the third quarter. West scored 28 points in the game.

  Many fans would love it if games like this were to happen everyday. There are a couple of leagues currently operating that do regularly feature games with scoring like that, however further reading in this blog is one of several ways to find out which leagues I am referring to. I will not tell you the secret tomorrow, however we will take another look at international Ice Hockey.