Larry Kenon

Larry Joe Kenon (born December 13, 1952) is an American former professional basketball player.

A 6'9" forward who had a productive career in both the American Basketball Association (ABA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA), Kenon played for the New York Nets, San Antonio Spurs, Chicago Bulls, Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers. His nickname was "Special K."

College

Kenon transferred from Amarillo College to play basketball at Memphis State University. In his junior year, 1972–73, he averaged 20.1 points and 16.7 rebounds per game and led the Tigers to the NCAA championship game, where they were defeated by the Bill Walton-led UCLA Bruins. After that season, one in which he was named Missouri Valley Conference Men's Basketball Player of the Year, Kenon left Memphis State and turned pro.

ABA career

In 1973, the Detroit Pistons selected Kenon in the third round (15th pick overall) of the NBA Draft. He was also drafted by the Memphis Tams of the ABA, but the New York Nets secured his draft rights. During his 1973-74 rookie season, Kenon averaged 15.9 points and 11.5 rebounds per game on the Julius Erving-led Nets team that won the 1974 ABA Championship.

Julius Erving

Julius Winfield Erving II (born February 22, 1950), commonly known by the nickname Dr. J, is an American retired basketball player who helped popularize a modern style of play that emphasizes leaping and playing above the rim. Erving helped legitimize the American Basketball Association (ABA) and was the best-known player in that league when it merged with the National Basketball Association (NBA) after the 1975–76 season.

Erving won three championships, four Most Valuable Player Awards, and three scoring titles with the ABA's Virginia Squires and New York Nets (now the NBA's Brooklyn Nets) and the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers. He is the sixth-highest scorer in ABA/NBA history with 30,026 points (NBA and ABA combined). He was well known for slam dunking from the free throw line in slam dunk contests and was the only player voted Most Valuable Player in both the American Basketball Association and the National Basketball Association.

Erving was inducted in 1993 into the Basketball Hall of Fame and was also named to the NBA's 50th Anniversary All-Time team. In 1994, Erving was named by Sports Illustrated as one of the 40 most important athletes of all time. In 2004, he was inducted into the Nassau County Sports Hall of Fame.

Slam dunk

A slam dunk, also dunk or dunk shot, is a type of basketball shot that is performed when a player jumps in the air, controls the ball(s) above the horizontal plane of the rim, and scores by putting the ball directly through the basket with one or both hands. This is considered a normal field goal attempt; if successful it is worth two points. Such a shot was known as a "dunk shot" until the term "slam dunk" was coined by former Los Angeles Lakers announcer Chick Hearn.

The slam dunk is the most efficient basketball shot. Moreover, it is a crowd-pleaser. Thus, the maneuver is often extracted from the basketball game and showcased in slam dunk contests. Perhaps the most popular is the NBA Slam Dunk Contest held during the annual NBA All-Star Weekend. The seminal incarnation of the NBA Slam Dunk Contest was held during the half-time of the 1976 American Basketball Association All-Star Game.

Dunking was banned in the NCAA from 1967 to 1976. Many people have attributed this to the dominance of the then-college phenomenon Lew Alcindor (now known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar); the no-dunking rule is sometimes referred to as the "Lew Alcindor rule."

George Gervin

George "The Iceman" Gervin (born April 27, 1952) is an American retired professional basketball player who played in both the American Basketball Association (ABA) and National Basketball Association (NBA) for the Virginia Squires, San Antonio Spurs, and Chicago Bulls. Gervin averaged at least 14 points per game in all 14 of his ABA and NBA seasons, and finished with an NBA career average of 26.2 points per game. Gervin is widely regarded to be one of the greatest shooting guards in NBA history.

Career

High school and college

Gervin attended Martin Luther King, Jr. High School, where he struggled on and off the court until he reached his senior year, when he had a growth spurt and averaged 31 points and 20 rebounds to lead his school to the state quarterfinals.

Gervin received a scholarship to play for Jerry Tarkanian at Long Beach State, but had such a culture shock that he returned home before the first semester was over. He transferred to Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Michigan and averaged 29.5 points as a sophomore forward in 1971–72.

Slam Dunk Contest

The NBA Slam Dunk Contest (officially known as the Verizon Slam Dunk for sponsorship reasons) is an annual National Basketball Association (NBA) competition held during the NBA All-Star Weekend. The contest was inaugurated by the American Basketball Association (ABA) at its All-Star Game in 1976 in Denver, the same year the slam dunk was legalized in the NCAA. As a result of the ABA-NBA merger later that year there would not be another slam dunk contest at the professional level until 1984. The contest has adopted several formats over the years, including, until 2014, the use of fan voting, via text-messaging, to determine the winner of the final round.

The very first slam dunk contest was won by Julius Erving of the Nets at the 1976 ABA All-Star Game. The current champion of the NBA Dunk Contest is Zach LaVine of the Minnesota Timberwolves.

History

1976 ABA Slam Dunk Contest

On January 27, 1976 at McNichols Sports Arena during halftime of the 1976 ABA All Star Game the first-ever Slam Dunk Contest was held, which was won by Julius Erving of the New York Nets over David Thompson of the Denver Nuggets, Artis Gilmore of the Kentucky Colonels, and George Gervin and Larry Kenon of the San Antonio Spurs. There was a format each competitor had to follow in which they must attempt 5 dunks in a row under two minutes. One from a standing position, one from a distance of ten feet away from the basket (which is basically the bottom of the semi circle that surrounds the free throw line in the Key. The next 3 were freelance positions, one coming in from the left side of the basket, one coming in from the right side of the basket and finally from either corner down the baseline to the basket. They were judged on artistic ability, imagination, body flow as well as fan response.