Reminder: I would love to hear/read/see you share your favorite 2023 basketball highlight
Also: Happy World Basketball Day
ORLANDO — First things first: I’d like to wish you a Happy World Basketball Day.
For real.
It was announced in August during the FIBA World Cup that World Basketball Day would indeed be placed on calendars internationally on Dec. 21 because that is recorded as the date Dr. James Naismith is credited with introducing the game of basketball at the Springfield YMCA in 1891.
Next up: This request has been lodged in a few places elsewhere this week, but I wanted to ask it (at least) one more time before I leave the G League Showcase here in Central Florida and with the focus soon to shift to the NBA’s five-game Christmas Day slate …
I’m looking for community contributors to my 2023 Year In Review piece to be published next week. It will feature a listing of some of my favorite basketball moments from the calendar year that we’re wrapping up shortly, but I want to print some of yours along with it.
So …
The comment section below is a great place to register your standout basketball memory from the past 12 months. The same goes for the comment section in Tuesday’s newsletter. Or the two recent chat threads found in my Substack Chat room.
Let me know what professional basketball moment from 2023 will stick with you. And why!
Marc, I do love the picture of The Circle that is sports. In 2023, we saw one phenom putting the final chapter(s) in a career that started with a much anticipated lottery in 2003. LeBron hit that iconic shot that broke another phenom’s all-time scoring record. Later in the year, we welcomed another much anticipated lottery, and another star, Wemby, debuted. Circle!
My favorite basketball memory from 2023 is being on the sidelines as the Game Experience crew at the Basketball World Cup at Okinawa Arena, and watching Japan achieve their first Olympic berth since 1976 on its own merit (they played in Tokyo in 2021 as the host nation). I’ve never seen a Japanese crowd that intense and united in a basketball game.