1957-58 - Pettit's attitude lifts Hawks
The NBA cemented its big-league image when the Fort Wayne Pistons moved to
Detroit and the Rochester Royals moved to Cincinnati. Just three years earlier,
half the NBA's teams were located in cities with less than a million people. Now
only Syracuse was in that category. The fans of Detroit were especially happy
since the league's leading scorer, Yardley was a member of their team. He was
the first player to score over 2,000 points in a season, with the average of
27.8 ppg.
Boston in the East and St. Louis in the West were clearly the class of the
league, winning easily their divisions . Boston defeated to advance to the
Finals, while St. Louis bested Detroit. When the first two games brought a 1-1
tie, many thought it would be a classic long series. However, in game 3, Bill
Russell suffered an injury, which put the team into a nasty situation. With
gritty determination, after four games, the series was 2-2. St. Louis won the
next game and in game 6, Bob Pettit scored 50 points for the Hawks. It was to be
the only league title for St. Louis, won by Pettit, who led the Hawks to the NBA
Finals four times, and retired after 11 seasons as the NBA's all-time leading
scorer with 20,880 points.
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