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1975–76 ABA season

9th edition of the ABA championship From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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The 1975–76 ABA season was the ninth and final season of the American Basketball Association. The shot clock was changed from 30 to 24 seconds in order to match the system that was utilized by the NBA. Former NBA player Dave DeBusschere was the league's newest commissioner after Tedd Munchak resigned, ultimately being its seventh and last one. This was also the only season that did not finish the season with the East-West division setup, as it was ultimately abandoned after the Utah Stars folded operations, being the third team to do so during the season. The NBA would later adopt the ABA's three-point shot, starting with the 1979–80 season, initially as a gimmick before making it a more permanent fixture to their league.

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Prior to the start of the season, the Memphis Sounds relocated to Baltimore, Maryland, and briefly became the Baltimore Hustlers,[1] then the Baltimore Claws. The Claws folded during the preseason in October after playing three exhibition games.[2] The San Diego Conquistadors were replaced for the 1975–76 season by the San Diego Sails, but folded in November,[3] followed by the Utah Stars in early December.[4] The Virginia Squires folded in May following the end of the regular season, but before the conclusion of the 1976 ABA Playoffs,[5] due to them being unable to make a $75,000 league assessment one month before league merger talks with the NBA began.

The 1976 ABA All-Star Game saw the first place Denver Nuggets come from behind to defeat the ABA All Stars 144–138 in Denver. The game saw the first ever Slam Dunk Contest, won by Julius Erving.

With the conclusion of the season, the June 1976 ABA-NBA merger saw the Denver Nuggets, Indiana Pacers, New York Nets, and San Antonio Spurs join the NBA, while the Kentucky Colonels and Spirits of St. Louis accepted deals to fold. The deal accepted by the Spirits' owners, Ozzie and Daniel Silna, would turn out to be quite lucrative, as they agreed to receive a seventh of the television revenue generated by each of the four newly added franchises in perpetuity.

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Teams

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Map of teams

ABA Teams
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Regular season

On April 19, 1976, the final ABA MVP award was given to Julius Erving. Erving received 32-of-35 votes from the media voting, with Bobby Jones, David Thompson, and James Silas garnering the remaining votes. Erving had won the scoring title (averaging 29.3 points per game) while averaging 11 rebounds a game (5th), and field goal percentage (.517, 8th best). He was the third pro basketball player to win three straight league MVPs after Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain.[6]

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Final standings

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Asterisk (*) denotes playoff team
† did not survive the end of the season.

Bold – ABA champions

Playoffs

The 1976 ABA Playoffs opened with the Kentucky Colonels defeating the Indiana Pacers 2 games to 1 in the quarterfinals. The Colonels then lost a seven-game semifinal series to the #1 seeded Denver Nuggets, 4 games to 3. The other semifinal saw the New York Nets outlast the San Antonio Spurs 4 games to 3. In the finals the Nets beat the Nuggets, 4 games to 2.

Awards and honors

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David Thompson (Denver) and Julius Erving (New York) at the 1976 ABA All-Star Game
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References

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