The then-CCHS girls’ basketball team in 1916 ended with a record of 4-2, with both losses against Concordia. They won games against Wakefield and Wamego. They played all three teams twice to round out the season. Their highest score was 27 points, with the lowest at 5.
The team included just seven players, four of whom had never played the game. Captain: Rosetta Chestnut, Guard: Meda Hahn, Forwards: Margaret Farrell, Velma Smith, 1st Center: Elizabeth Henry, 2nd Center: Olga Heimerich, Substitute: Myrna Woerner.
The same year, the boys’ team had eight players and went 9-5 with one tie game. They took second in the district, which included schools like Salina, Washington, Washburn, Manhattan, and Mankato.
Today the CCCHS girls’ basketball team has twice as many players.
In 1916, basketball was a relatively new sport, first invented in 1891 when PE professor, James Naismith, needed a sport to keep athletes busy during New England winters. Initially, goals were peach baskets with their bottoms intact, meaning the ball had to be manually retrieved after every point. Metal hoops with backboards were introduced in 1906. The latter was added to keep spectators from interfering. When watching games, fans would sit in the mezzanine balconies of gyms and swat at the ball.
The game was originally played with a soccer ball; those at the time were made from leather and hosted laces. Basketballs did not become orange until 1950, when a college administrator thought the ball should be more visible.
Not long after Naismith created the game, fellow PE instructor, Senda Berenson came to watch the game. The first organized women’s game was played just 11 months later.
The first games hosted nine vs. nine, but soon switched to 10 total when soccer teams began playing basketball during winter months. In addition, there was no dribbling. First, students ran with the ball, but Naismith was quoted in saying it became too violent as his students punched, fought, and tackled. That led him to create a rule about traveling and fouls. For some time players simply had to throw the ball up and down the court, until dribbling was introduced.
The game came to Kansas in 1898, when Naismith was hired as the University of Kansas’ PE teacher and chapel instructor. In his classes he taught basketball and soon put together a team that played games against the local YMCA.
Naismith also coached Forrest “Phog” Allen, who is known as the father of basketball coaching and who also coached at KU. However, Naismith discouraged him from coaching, saying “You can’t coach basketball; you can just play it.”
By the early 1900s, intercollegiate games took place, with most Eastern colleges hosting their own basketball teams. However, Naismith was more interested in being a physical education instructor.
Basketball served as an exhibition sport in the 1904 Olympics, and was added as an event in 1936. The National Association of Basketball Coaches, founded by Allen, paid for Naismith’s trip to watch the inaugural event where, at 74 years old, he handed out metals to the medaling teams: the U.S. for gold, Canada for silver, and Mexico for bronze. In total, he worked at KU for more than four decades.
