1973 Overview
From Hoopedia
1972-73 NBA Season
Tiny dominated.
It’s not often in NBA history that you can say that.
But Nate “Tiny” Archibald, a showman with all the New York playground moves, pulled off an amazing feat in 1972-73, leading the league in scoring and assists. That, combined with his longtime excellence, earned him a place in the Hall of Fame.
It’s hard to say what was more impressive, the fact that as a 6-1 guard he averaged 34.0 points a game, or that he also whipped an average of 11.4 assists each night to his teammates. Consider the remarkable degree of difficulty. He performed these feats for the Kings, a team that divided its home games between Kansas City, Mo., and Omaha, Neb., after moving from Cincinnati (where they had been the Royals) for the 1972-73 season.
Although the Kings went 36-46 and didn’t qualify for the playoffs, Archibald wowed the league in just his third pro season.
Nearly three decades later, no one has come close to matching Archibald’s dual achievement. And despite his slender frame, he played a league-leading 46 minutes per game.
Outside of Archibald’s big numbers, the season belonged to the Boston Celtics and New York Knickerbockers. Willis Reed returned to the Knicks after injuries had limited him to 11 games the previous season. New York, which won the title in 1970 but lost the championship series to the Lakers in ’72, was primed to make a run at a second trophy.
Jerry Lucas shared the center spot with Reed, giving New York a tag team of Hall of Famers. Bill Bradley and Dave DeBusschere were the sweet-shooting forwards, with rangy Phil Jackson in reserve.
The backcourt provided an interesting chemistry lesson. In his years with the Baltimore Bullets, Earl Monroe had engaged the Knicks’ Walt Frazier in some emotional battles. With Monroe’s coming to the Knicks (New York had traded Mike Riordan and Dave Stallworth to get him), the longtime adversaries not only learned to coexist, but brought out the best in each other by sharing the load.
The top team during the regular season was Boston, which had rebuilt around John Havlicek with young stars Jo Jo White and Dave Cowens, veteran Paul Silas, and 1969 title team holdovers Don Chaney, Don Nelson and Satch Sanders.
Boston won 68 games, just one shy of the league record the Lakers established a season earlier. At the other end of the standings, the Philadelphia 76ers, who lost Billy Cunningham to the ABA, suffered through an NBA record-worst 9-73 season.
New York breezed past Baltimore in the Eastern Conference Playoffs, then battled tooth and nail with Boston before the Celtics succumbed 94-78 in a surprisingly easy Game 7.
With Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, Gail Goodrich, and Happy Hairston still pushing it, the Lakers made a run at defending their first title since moving to Los Angeles. They defeated Chicago (led by Jerry Sloan, Chet Walker and Bob Love) in seven games, then moved past a well-balanced Golden State team in five to reach the Finals.
It was the Knicks against the Lakers for the third time in four years, so there were few secrets between the two teams. After the Lakers edged New York in Game 1, the Knicks won four straight closely contested games to bring a second NBA title to New York.
“The Knicks are so well-balanced,” Chamberlain said afterward, “and have tremendous passing and so many good shooters, you can’t concentrate on one man. The key to the series was that their defense stopped our running game.”
The outcome marked the swan song for the big center in the league championship series. He had taken three different teams to seven appearances in the Finals, winning twice.
