FOOTBALL NEWS AND GOOGLE TRENDS

Dr. James Naismith is known worldwide as the inventor of basketball. Born in 1861 in Ramsay township, near Almonte, Ontario, Canada. The concept of basketball was born from Naismith school days in the area where he played a simple child’s game known as duck on a rock-a school outside their room. The game involved attempting to knock a “duck” on top of a rock by throwing another stone in it. Naismith attended McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

After serving as McGill’s Athletic Director, James Naismith moved to the YMCA Training School in Springfield, Massachusetts, USA in 1891, where the sport of basketball was born. In Springfield, Naismith was faced with the problem of finding a sport that was suitable for play inside during the Massachusetts winter for students in the School of Christian Workers. Naismith wanted to create a game of skill of the students rather than one that relied solely on strength. He needed a game that can be played indoors in a relatively small space. The first game was played with a soccer ball and two peach baskets used as goals. Naismith joined the faculty of the University of Kansas in 1898, teaching physical education and being a chaplain.

James Naismith devised a set of thirteen rules of basketball:

1. The ball can be thrown in any direction with one or both hands.
2. The ball can be beaten in any direction with one or both hands, but never with the fist.
3. A player can not run the ball. The player must throw it from the place where the traps, the assignment was a man running at good speed.
4. The ball must be held in or between the hands. The arms or body must not be used for holding it.
5. No shouldering, holding, pushing, striking or tripping an opponent. The first violation of this rule by any person shall count as a foul, the second shall disqualify him until the next goal is made or, if there was evident intent to injure a person, for the whole game. Not allow substitution.
6. A foul is striking the ball with the fist, violations of Articles 3 and 4, as described in Rule 5.
7. If either side make three consecutive fouls it shall count as a goal for the opponents (consecutive means without the opponents in the meantime making a foul).
8. Goal is made when the ball is thrown or beaten from the ground to the basket and stays there, providing the defenders of the goal do not touch or disturb the goal. If the ball rests on the edge and the opponents move the basket, it counts as a goal.
9. When the ball leaves the field, will be thrown into the field and played by the first person to touch it. In case of dispute the umpire shall throw it directly in the field. The thrower has five seconds. If you already have, go to the opponent. If any side persists in delaying the game, the referee shall call a foul on them.
10. The referee shall be judge of men and shall note the fouls and notify the referee when three consecutive fouls have been made. Shall have power to disqualify men according to Rule 5.
11. The referee shall be judge of the ball and decide when it is at stake in the field, on which side it belongs, and keep the time. He will decide when a goal has been made and keep account of the objectives with other functions that are usually performed by a referee.
12. The time shall be two 15 minute halves with five minutes rest between them.
13. The team with most goals in that time will be declared the winner.

Besides the creation of basketball, James Naismith graduated as a medical doctor, primarily interested in sports physiology and what we would today call sports science and as Presbyterian minister, with a strong interest in philosophy and clean living. Naismith watched his sport, basketball, introduced in many nations by the YMCA movement as early as 1893. Basketball was introduced at the Berlin Olympics in 1936. Naismith was flown to Berlin to watch the games. He died in Lawrence, Kansas, in 1939.

Today basketball has become one of the most popular sports in the world.