1979-1981: historical question

[JB]

On Dec 25, 2007, at 12:05 AM, Eric Albert wrote:

> How often did this happen?

> What constituted illegal defense back then?
>
> -- Eric
************
I doubt if any one kept any totals Eric and I don't remember a single  
occurrence, but there must have been some.
As far as I know, any zone defense was illegal, until 2001.
There was this  famous technical in Celtics history, here detailed by  
Wikipedia:

In what has been called the greatest game ever played[1], Game 5 of  
the 1976 NBA Finals between the Phoenix Suns and Boston Celtics, the  
Suns found themselves one point down with one second left in double  
overtime, no time outs remaining and possession of the ball under  
their defensive basket after a John Havlicek bucket. Faced with the  
near-impossibility of sinking an 80 foot desperation shot, Suns'  
guard Paul Westphal hit upon an unusual solution. He intentionally  
called a timeout the Suns did not have. While this gave the Celtics a  
free throw, which Jo Jo White successfully converted to increase the  
lead to two, it gave the Suns possession at halfcourt. This enabled  
Gar Heard to sink an 18-footer as time expired to force a third  
overtime. NBA rules were changed the following year to prevent a  
repeat occurrence by not advancing the inbounds pass to halfcourt in  
similar situations.

	JB