The Move To Philadelphia

The Syracuse Nationals were struggling by the 1960’s, and Syracuse was a rather small city so they could not be profitable. So Biasone sold the team to Irv Kosloff who brought the team to Philadelphia in 1963. There was a contest to choose a new name for the team and the name “76ers” was chosen. The name was significant as it related to the 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence.

The 1966 season was their first successful season. Their head coach was Alex Hannum who led the team to a season record of 68-13, the best in the NBA at the time. They went on to beat the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals putting their eight year reign to an end. The perfect season was complete when they beat the Golden State Warriors (San Francisco) to win their first NBA Championship.

The years after that were not as successful and the 76ers declined to a certain extent. Their fortunes turned around again in 1976 when the team was taken over by F. Eugene Dixon and they acquired Julius Erving. They made it to the Eastern Conference finals again and defeated the Houston Rockets. But they lost in the NBA Finals to the Portland Trail Blazers.

They tasted success again in 1982 after Harold Katz bought the team. With players like Julius Erving, Moses Malone, Maurice Cheeks and Andrew Toney, they went on to win 65 games that season. The team advanced to the NBA Finals and beat the Los Angeles Lakers to win their second NBA Championship as the 76ers.

The 76ers went through another decline of sorts after that and picked up only in 2000 when Allen Iverson was picked for the team. That year, the team moved to CoreStates Center, their new home arena. They made it to the NBA Finals again but this time they lost to the Los Angeles Lakers. It was still quite a good year for the 76ers as Iverson won the NBA’s Most Valuable Player, Larry Brown was named Coach of the Year and Aaron Mckie was named Sixth Man of the Year.

The current team features players like Thaddeus Young, Bobby Jones, Samuel Dalembert and Jason Smith who under the guidance of Head Coach Maurice Cheeks have the potential to make the 76ers a winning team again.