By 1890, after earning a bachelor’s degree in Physical Education from McGill and a second Diploma from Presbyterian College in Montreal, Naismith became McGill’s first director of athletics, a post he accepted after initially returning to his alma mater to teach physical education. However, one year later Naismith accepted a job as an instructor at the YMCA Training School in Springfield, Massachusetts. It was there that the sport of basketball was invented in 1891.

While working at the YMCA Training School, Dr. James Naismith was challenged by the Training School’s head of Physical Education, Dr. Luther H. Gulick, to create a game that could be played in a relatively small space.  Dr. Gulick wanted to provide an “athletic distraction” to an unruly group of students who only became increasingly irritable when confined indoors during the harsh New England winters.  Dr. Gulick insisted that the game help keep track athletes in shape while not being “too rough” to promote balanced competition amongst all the players.  The entire undertaking was to be in complete 14 days.

Naismith decided he wanted to come up with a game of skill instead of one that relied solely on strength. In order to accomplish this task, the inventor of basketball studied the most widely played sports of the time (rugby, lacrosse, soccer, football, hockey and baseball). After much analysis, Naismith realized that any activity involving running, dribbling or swinging at a small fast ball would have an inherent danger, since most physical contact occurred in those instances.  Therefore, Naismith insisted that the ball be big and soft like the ones used for soccer.  He further reduced the risk of physical contact by making passing the only legal means of advancing the ball.  Lastly, he thought it best to place the goal high above the heads of the player’s to make it virtually un-guardable and forced participants to score goals by throwing a soft lob shot similar to the toss that had proven effective in his favorite childhood game of duck on a rock.  Naismith nicknamed this new game “Basket Ball” and instituted the original 13 basketball rules. (below)

Basketball’s inaugural contest was played in December 1891. Unlike the today’s game, the first basketball game was played using a soccer ball with nine players on either team, who shot at goals made from peach baskets. Moreover, since the ball could only be advanced via a pass, the original rules did not accommodate for what is known in today’s game as dribbling. There are many other differences between today’s game and the basketball rules at inception. Take a look at the original Basketball rules below.