Footage of Wilt's legendary game 6 performance in the 1970 finals.

[coastalmarker99]

With the Lakers facing elimination in the 1970 finals after an embarrassing loss in game 5.



Wilt Chamberlain in game 6 would go off for 45 points and 27 rebounds on 74 percent shooting to send the finals to a deciding seventh game in New York.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcRpBiMKwF4


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VFy8BTYNDE

[coastalmarker99]

Also here is Wilt's post-game interview.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnRZOC2olQ4

[SouBeachTalents]

That's what would drive me crazy about Wilt. Why did he not try to duplicate this in Game 7 against a severely injured Reed? Doesn't even reach half the scoring total while taking 11 less shots. Ditto the rest of the series, he barely cracks 20 points and consistently takes less than half the shot attempts that he did in Game 6. In Game 3 they lost by 3 points, he takes 10 shots. Game 5 Reed gets hurt and they lost by 7, he takes 12 shots. Game 7 of the Finals, after destroying the Knicks in Game 6, he's content taking 16 shots and barely scoring 20 points.

I understand he took on a secondary scoring/Bill Russell role with the Lakers, but I felt like that came to the detriment of the team at times, most notably this series and esp the year before.

[Manny98]

Shame he choked in game 7 :(

[coastalmarker99]

That's what would drive me crazy about Wilt. Why did he not try to duplicate this in Game 7 against a severely injured Reed? Doesn't even reach half the scoring total while taking 11 less shots. Ditto the rest of the series, he barely cracks 20 points and consistently takes less than half the shot attempts that he did in Game 6. In Game 3 they lost by 3 points, he takes 10 shots. Game 5 Reed gets hurt and they lost by 7, he takes 12 shots. Game 7 of the Finals, after destroying the Knicks in Game 6, he's content taking 16 shots and barely scoring 20 points.

I understand he took on a secondary scoring/Bill Russell role with the Lakers, but I felt like that came at a detriment to the team at times, most notably in this series and esp the year before.


I agree with you as Wilt in my eyes had a serious problem with staying aggressive offensively in his Laker years from 1969 to 1973.


I mean him only taking 8 FGA in the 1973 finals is a mind**** especially when you consider when he finally got aggressive he dropped 23 points on 60 percent shooting in game 5 of that 1973 series.



I mean there is no excuse for him only taking.


4FGA

3FGA

8FGA


In games 2 to 4 of the 1973 finals.

[coastalmarker99]

Shame he choked in game 7 :(

Every single player on that Lakers team choked in that game seven.


West played terribly and allowed Walt Frazier to have the game of his life.



If you take away the shots that Wilt made in that game seven then the Lakers shooting percentage for that game seven would have been 33.3%

[coastalmarker99]

That's what would drive me crazy about Wilt. Why did he not try to duplicate this in Game 7 against a severely injured Reed? Doesn't even reach half the scoring total while taking 11 less shots. Ditto the rest of the series, he barely cracks 20 points and consistently takes less than half the shot attempts that he did in Game 6. In Game 3 they lost by 3 points, he takes 10 shots. Game 5 Reed gets hurt and they lost by 7, he takes 12 shots. Game 7 of the Finals, after destroying the Knicks in Game 6, he's content taking 16 shots and barely scoring 20 points.

I understand he took on a secondary scoring/Bill Russell role with the Lakers, but I felt like that came to the detriment of the team at times, most notably this series and esp the year before.


I can explain Wilt taking only 12 shots in game 5 of the 1970 finals despite the fact that Reed went down early in the first half.




NY Times writer Leonard Koppett after that game five, come-from-behind Knicks win said.

''That the Lakers were robbed, pure and simple. In the second half, the Knicks started cutting into the lead. The crowd went crazy and the officials wouldn't call anything against the Knicks."


And why did Koppett say that? West and Wilt, combined, took five FGAs in the entire second half.



And even with a massive disparity in FTAs, the fact remained that the officials "watched carefully as the Knicks' defence swarmed over the Lakers, especially West and Wilt, and decided that most of the Knicks harassment was legal."

[coastalmarker99]

Through it is justified to criticize Wilt for not being able to duplicate this incredible performance against Reed in game seven.




It should be noted that Wilt was four months removed from major knee surgery.



Virtually no one else would have been playing at all, much less as well as he did.


I mean https://news.google.com/newspapers?n...,5098849&hl=en

Read that article. It says that Kerlan claimed that Wilt's knee injury was nearly identical to the one that Baylor had suffered a few years prior. It occurred in game one of the '65 playoffs, on April 3rd.


He played his first game on October 15th in '66. A full six months after the injury. But he was just a shell of himself the entire season. He missed 15 games that year, and his production went from 27.1 ppg in '65, down to 16.6 ppg in '66.


In fact, he would sadly never be the same player he had been again.

So, it took Baylor essentially a year and a half to semi fully recover from the same injury that Wilt "recovered" from in four months (Nov 7th when he injured it, to March 18th.)

To Wilt's credit despite basically playing on one good leg he did put up the only 20-20 60.0 Finals in NBA history (23.2 ppg, 24.1 rpg, and on a .62.5 FG% in these finals.

[coastalmarker99]

That's what would drive me crazy about Wilt. Why did he not try to duplicate this in Game 7 against a severely injured Reed? Doesn't even reach half the scoring total while taking 11 less shots. Ditto the rest of the series, he barely cracks 20 points and consistently takes less than half the shot attempts that he did in Game 6. In Game 3 they lost by 3 points, he takes 10 shots. Game 5 Reed gets hurt and they lost by 7, he takes 12 shots. Game 7 of the Finals, after destroying the Knicks in Game 6, he's content taking 16 shots and barely scoring 20 points.

I understand he took on a secondary scoring/Bill Russell role with the Lakers, but I felt like that came to the detriment of the team at times, most notably this series and esp the year before.

I saw a lot of the Lebron-Wade (Bosh) chemistry issues in that first year in LA with West-Wilt (Baylor.) Lebron was tentative because he just didn't know what his real role was in his first year in Miami. Same with Chamberlain in 1969.



VBK told Wilt from day one that he didn't want him clogging the low post so that a declining Baylor could roam the baseline. And the finals were just a mess.

I wish I could find the quote in which Van Breda Kolff said something along this, "When we pass the ball into Wilt, sure he will score. But it is an ugly offence to watch."

And the main reason that VBK was fired right after the '69 Finals (alright, technically he quit since he knew the ax was about to fall on him) was his handling of Chamberlain. And then Joe Mullaney came in and immediately structured the offence around Wilt (albeit West was still getting his points.)

And while this was not a peak Wilt (he was having physical problems dating back to early '67-68), he was about to have one of the GOAT seasons in NBA history.

In his first nine games, he was leading the league in scoring, rebounding, and FG% (32.2 ppg, 20.6 rpg, and on a .57.9 FG%.) And those numbers were not inflated by 1-2 big games, but rather seven excellent games in the nine he played.

Games of 33. 35, 37, 38, 42, and 43 points...along with a 25-23-5 9-14 game against Alcindor (Kareem.)


And even those numbers were lower than what he would have had had he not shred his knee in the third quarter in game nine of that season when he had already scored 33 points (on 13-14 shooting) in only 28 minutes.

He was likely on his way to a 40+ point game (hell, probably a 50+ point game.) Had he played 48 minutes in that game, and say scored 43 points, which was very reasonable, he would have finished that game with a season average of 33.3 ppg at the time.

Think about that. A 33-year-old Wilt was on his way to a 33-21-3 .57.9 season in 1970 when he blew out his knee.


Why do I bring that up?



Because a peak Kareem's greatest statistical season would come two years later, at 35-17-5 .57.4.

[Manny98]

Imagine going 1-11 from the line in a game 7 of the finals :oldlol:

Worst thing is that wasn't even Chokerlains worst chokejob

[coastalmarker99]

Imagine going 1-11 from the line in a game 7 of the finals :oldlol:

Worst thing is that wasn't even Chokerlains worst chokejob


I have long maintained that a team of Jordan's would not have beaten the Knicks that day.

The Knicks came out on fire, hitting 15-21, and never looked back.



Even if Wilt had hit all of the free throws that he missed in the first half the Lakers still would have been down by over 20 points at halftime.

[Horatio33]

You blame injury as a reason Wilt had a terrible game 7 and then you blame Jerry West for Walt Fraizer going off. West played game 7 with two sprained thumbs. Don't know if you've ever played basketball but hands are quite important. So you give Wilt a pass for a game 7 no show despite the game before he had 49 points and in game 7 he was going up against a man who couldn't run but you blame West for struggling to dribble a basketball against one of the best defensive guards ever while having two sprained thumbs.

I know you're a Chamberlain fan but you need to be more objective at times.

[Axe]

You blame injury as a reason Wilt had a terrible game 7 and then you blame Jerry West for Walt Fraizer going off. West played game 7 with two sprained thumbs. Don't know if you've ever played basketball but hands are quite important. So you give Wilt a pass for a game 7 no show despite the game before he had 49 points and in game 7 he was going up against a man who couldn't run but you blame West for struggling to dribble a basketball against one of the best defensive guards ever while having two sprained thumbs.

I know you're a Chamberlain fan but you need to be more objective at times.
He usually has to cherry pick about his hero you know.