Games in Berlin when lié found |)
out what the, foreign countries
wanted to do to his beloved
game. It was quite a setback
for him in the moment of his
greatest triumph—when he saw
the athletes of 21 nations parti-
cipating in the game which he
had invented 45 years previ-
ously.

KEEP ’EM SHORT |

You’ll remember that the
‘American squad, which won
the championship quite easily,
was made up of a combination
of the local boys who won the
Olympic playoff and the Okla-
homa gang who were runners-
up. Among them were such
human Hiffel Towers as Joe
Fortenberry, who was 6ft. 8in.
tall, and any number of other
giraffe-like individuals. When
they lined up against the nor-
mal or undersized foreigners
they made a joke of the game,
for, in addition to the enormous
advantage of size, they were a
great deal more skillful and ex-
perienced. Well, to make you
see the reaction, the Interna-
tional Federation promptly be-
gan discussing a regulation to
limit the game to players of 6ft.
and under. How’s that for a
regulation on a world’s cham-
pionship event?

OUT OF OLYMPICS

Anyhow, that was the end of
basketball as an Olympic event
—at least for the present. It
won't be played at Helsinki in
1940. As a matter of fact, of
course, height is an advantage
when everything else is equal,
but it isn’t a necessity. Sam
Barry is doing pretty well with
a Trojan squad that isn’t any
too tall and apparently the best
high school basketball team in
this neighborhood is the Holly-
wood High team, which doesn’t~|
have a single 6-footer on the
line-up. But, at all events,
when the coaches labor under
the notion that the way to im-
prove a game is to change the
rules they certainly gum things
up. The game’s exciting, all
right, but it’s more maddening
than anything else.

THE GOOD DOCTOR

When Doc Naismith started
the. game of basketball he had
nine players on a side... The |.
/ reason was that he was simply
inventing a game to give winter
exercise to a group of 18, so he
just divided ’em into two teams
... His players were all guys
training to become Y.M.C.A. sec-
retaries . . . One of the original
players, I believe, lives in Red-
lands now... Naismith is a
double-doctor ... He is a doc-
tor of medicine and an ordained
minister... He has never
worked at either profession, but

as been in athletic work all his
life ... He’s on the faculty at
the University of Kansas and
Phog Allen, who coaches basket-
ball there, has had remarkable

a ¥

success...