Joel Embiid scored 70 last night. That surpassed the 76ers' all-time scoring record, previously held by Wilt Chamberlain. It's not every day someone breaks one of Wilt's records. It's even rarer to find out there's one he never held at all.
You might think I'm talking about some really unimportant, made-up stat. Not exactly. See, this is the all-time single-game field goals record.
When Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points that fateful day in Hershey, he made 36 field goals. The second-most ever made in a professional basketball game in the United States. The guy who'd made more had already held the record for over 50 years.
Now, you might not be entirely surprised that there are a couple records still around from before the NBA: Pat Herlihy once had 14 fouls in a game when the teams waived the foul-out rule. The New York Renaissance once won 88 consecutive games because, pre-integration, they had all the top black players on the same team.
But a scoring record is a different story. In 1908-09, the average professional basketball team scored 29.65 ppg. Bill Keenan of the Johnstown Johnnies, on March 16, 1909, scored 76. The previous all-time single-game scoring record was 40... he had 44 by halftime.
What's really incredible, though, is that he didn't make or attempt a single free throw. Keenan had 38 field goals made, two more than Mr. Chamberlain ever would.
Bill Keenan was particularly notable as a talented shooter from the corners and basketball's first great second-chance scorer. He had started at center for four championship teams: the 1902-03 Camden Electrics, 1904-05 Conshohocken Giants, 1906-07 East Liverpool Potters, and 1907-08 East Liverpool Potters (and would later get a fifth title with Johnstown in 1911-12). What's quite amusing is that he was never a first-option scorer. Very little is known about how he actually went about making his 38 field goals, the paper's only commentary in that regard was that "half his shots were from the sides and corners of the cage."
But that doesn't at all explain how one guy could sink three times as many shots as the average team, does it. Well, this does: their opponent was supposed to be the very East Liverpool team Keenan had just won back-to-back titles with. East Liverpool's owner was having financial troubles and had sold every rotational player the previous summer, turning a 53-19 team into a 4-67 one overnight. 29 players came and went over the course of the year, and the team was sold and relocated to Alliance, Ohio less than a month earlier. By this time, the Potters' roster consisted of East Liverpool's eighth man and four rookies. One of them, guard Army Thompson, put together a very respectable nine-year pro career. The rest did not. Keenan's matchup, Leo Mackey, was the worst of the bunch, a 5'8" center who lasted just 15 games as a pro. This was the last of the 15.
The Alliance Potters were indescribably bad at professional basketball. They lost 51-15 to South Side. 75-14 to McKeesport. 49-21 to Greensburg, then 78-25 in the rematch game. By the time they faced Bill Keenan, it was the last game of the season, and the last time pro ball would ever exist in the little town of Alliance.
Bill Keenan's Johnstown Johnnies beat the Alliance Potters 110-9. Another record that still stands 115 years later and has very little chance of being broken anytime soon.
As for the all-time field goal record? It doesn't look like anyone will reach 38 for quite a while. The last time someone even reached 30 was 50 years ago now (Rick Barry's 64/10/9 game against Portland). Embiid's game last night was the joint-most since Kobe's 81-pointer in 2006. He had 24.
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"Eastern Stars to Come Today." The Evening Review (East Liverpool, OH). November 7, 1908.
Elias, Josh. "Average Team Points Per Game Throughout Major League Professional Basketball History." The Elias Archives. May 9, 2021.
Gruber, John H. "League Record Broken by Johnstown Tossers." The Pittsburgh Post. March 17, 1909.
Kiser, Jack. "A New Peak for Wilt... 100 Points!" Philadelphia Daily News. March 3, 1962.
"Potters to Finish Season in Alliance." The Evening Review (East Liverpool, OH). February 22, 1909.
Rayl, Susan. “The New York Renaissance Professional Black Basketball Team.” A Thesis in Exercise and Sport Science, The Pennsylvania State University, 1996.
Zurlinden Jr., Pete. “Celtics Win over Locals.” The Dayton Herald. December 7, 1936.