When the Milwaukee Bucks took the court for their first game ever, 50 years ago this week
On Friday, the Bucks will play their first regular-season game at Fiserv Forum. Almost exactly 50 years earlier, they played their first regular-season game ever.
On Oct. 16, 1968, the Milwaukee Bucks stepped on the court at what was then called the Milwaukee Arena to take on the Chicago Bulls in the first NBA home game played in Milwaukee since 1955.
On Jan. 22, 1968, a group of Milwaukee investors led by Wesley D. Pavalon and Marvin L. Fishman was awarded one of the National Basketball Association's two expansion franchises to start in the 1968-'69 season.
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Through a naming contest, the new franchise got the name "Bucks." And the team put together a roster typical of a first-year franchise, with a mix of veterans nearing the end of their playing days and young players looking to make their mark.
Hopes were, to say the least, moderate.
"As an expansion club, the Bucks naturally will be the underdogs against all rivals in the powerful Eastern Division," Milwaukee Sentinel sports editor Lloyd Larson wrote in his Oct. 16, 1968, column. " … There would be more of a chance of miracles in the Western Division, with four of the seven members more or less in the expansion class."
Larson optimistically pointed out that, unlike the Milwaukee Hawks — Milwaukee's previous NBA team, which bolted for St. Louis in 1955, when the Braves were Milwaukee's favorite team — the Bucks didn't face competition from any other major-league sports teams in town.
Led by veteran center Wayne Embry and playmaking guard Guy Rodgers, the Bucks had finished with a respectable 5-4 record in the preseason.
"We've made great strides and I'm happy at what we've accomplished so far," Bucks coach Larry Costello told the Sentinel's Lou Chapman in an Oct. 14, 1968, story after the team's final preseason game, which also was against the Bulls at the Arena. " … I particularly like the hustle and desire on our club. We've got a great bunch of kids."
The "kids," led by 31-year-old Embry and 32-year-old Rodgers, "put on quite a show in the first half" of their first regular-season game, outscoring the Bulls 47-46 after two quarters, Chapman wrote in his Oct. 17 game story.
But the Bulls, coached by Dick Motta, turned the tables and made the shots that the Bucks missed in the second half, leaving Milwaukee's coach fuming as his team lost to the Bulls, 89-84.
"We missed free throws. We lacked ball movement. It's taking a long time for our players to work together," Costello told Chapman. "But we're going to drill … drill … drill until we get execution."
Rodgers led the Bucks with 16 points, while Embry poured in 15. Forwards Fred Hetzel and Bob Love chipped in 9 points each, while guards Jon McGlocklin and Bob Weiss each contributed 8 points.
The Bulls were paced by shooting guard Flynn Robinson, who had 23 points. (Robinson must have made an impression; on Nov. 23, 1968, the Bucks traded Love and Weiss to the Bulls for Robinson.)
Attendance for the first Bucks game was 8,467, back when the Arena's seating capacity was 10,746. (Fiserv Forum seats 17,500). Larson pointed out in an Oct. 18 column that it was more than the NBA teams in Atlanta and Baltimore drew in their season-openers.
"Perhaps even more encouraging than the gate count at the Arena was the crowd's enthusiasm," Larson wrote. "Judging from the cheering, screaming, clapping and booing (of the officials), one would have guessed that it was a battle for first place in March instead of game No. 1 in mid-October."
NBA Commissioner Walter Kennedy, who was in Milwaukee for that first game, told The Milwaukee Journal that he had confidence that the new franchise would do well.
"Obviously, the Bucks won't win any championships right away," Kennedy said. "But their organization is top-drawer — first class — and I'm sure the team will do equally well if the fans will allow it to do well."
The Bucks got off to a slow start that first season, going 0-5 before winning their first game on Oct. 31 against the Detroit Pistons. For the season, the Bucks went 27-55, finishing last in the Eastern Division.
As one of the two worst teams in the league, the Bucks joined the Phoenix Suns in a coin toss on March 19, 1969, after the season had ended, to see which would get the No. 1 pick in the upcoming draft. The Suns called heads, the coin came up tails and Bucks picked UCLA star Lew Alcindor.
Alcindor, who later changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, helped lead the Bucks to their first (and so far only) NBA title two years later.
Our Back Pages: 1968
About this feature
On Wednesdays this year, the Green Sheet's Our Back Pages will look back at 1968 in Milwaukee, sharing stories of the events that shaped and reflected a changing city as reported and photographed by the Journal Sentinel's predecessor newspapers, The Milwaukee Journal and Milwaukee Sentinel.
Special thanks and kudos go to senior multimedia designer Bill Schulz for finding many of the gems in the Journal Sentinel photo archives.