1946–47 National Basketball League (United States) season

The 1946–47 NBL season was the twelfth overall season for the U.S.A.'s National Basketball League (NBL) and its tenth season under that name after previously going by the Midwest Basketball Conference (a semipro or amateur precursor to the NBL) in its first two seasons of existence. This season also saw the NBL begin to operate itself as a proper, professional basketball league, as a key meeting they had in May 1946 had the league discussing key issues like major expansion, financing, a selective draft system for the NBL and set roster limits for each team, set schedules and exhibition matches, the possibility to have full-time officiating on board, and utilizing free agency for signing key players; many of these operating systems they utilized during this meeting would be key features for the future of professional basketball (primarily in the successor league known as the National Basketball Association) as we know it. Other professional or minor basketball leagues that were trying to get their footing back on track at the time (such as the American Basketball League, the New York State Professional Basketball League, and the New England Basketball League) had agreed to not infringe on each other's territories during this same meeting, though one new professional basketball league that was not a part of this meeting at the time was the Basketball Association of America, which would have greater long-term consequences for everyone involved. An entire book focusing on the NBL's existence would be released in 2009 by historian and author Murry R. Nelson called "The National Basketball League: A History, 1935–1949", with an entire chapter being dedicated to this season of play.

Entering this season, the NBL would see itself get to the highest number of teams it had since the inaugural NBL season under that league's name, with it seeing twelve teams competing in the league (with six teams being in both the Eastern Division and Western Division) due to the additions of the Anderson Duffey Packers, the Buffalo Bisons (later Tri-Cities Blackhawks, with this Bisons team not being related to the Buffalo Bisons team from the inaugural NBL season), the Detroit Gems, the Syracuse Nationals, and the Toledo Jeeps, with Syracuse effectively replacing the Cleveland Allmen Transfers this season in terms of team positioning only. As a result of the high number of teams participating in the NBL this season under a more structured organization, all twelve teams this season would play a league-high 44 games for this regular season, which was the highest number of scheduled games for an NBL season yet. Following the conclusion of the regular season, the NBL would add an extra round of playoffs in each division for the rest of its existence going forward, with this season utilizing what would be considered the modern-day playoff formatting with the best team in the division taking on the fourth-best team in the division and the second-best team taking on the third-best team in the division for the opening round in best of five matches before the two remaining teams from each division faced off against each other in what was considered to be the "Division Semifinals" for each division there in a best of three series before the two teams from each division competed against each other in a best of five series again for the NBL championship. For this season, the Chicago American Gears (who were ranked the #3 seed in the Western Division alongside the Sheboygan Red Skins despite having star center George Mikan on the team) upset the defending champion Rochester Royals 3–1 to win their first and only league championship, though the NBL's commissioner of the time, Ward Lambert, inexplicably considered the team that had the best regular season record for this season in the Rochester Royals to be the official NBL champions this season instead. That decision alongside a future decision regarding the NBL's president for the upcoming season would lead to the Chicago American Gears leaving the NBL to create their own rivaling professional basketball league in the Professional Basketball League of America.

Following its 12th season of existence as the NBL, the NBL and Basketball Association of America (the latter league not existing until just this upcoming season) merged operations to create the National Basketball Association. Despite the NBL continuing to exist until the 1948–49 NBL season as the longer-lasting operation, the NBL would not recognize the twelve NBL seasons (nor the two MBC precursor seasons nor even the one National Professional Basketball League season that inspired the league's creation) as a part of its own history (outside of certain circumstances), sometimes without comment. As such, none of the previous twelve NBL seasons nor even the two MBC seasons would officially be recognized by the NBA, with the NBA recognizing the 1946–47 BAA season as its first official season of play instead. Of the twelve NBL teams that competed in the league this season, eight of these teams (four from each division) would end up playing in what can be considered the modern-day NBA, with five of these teams still existing in the NBA to this very day (albeit under different names). After this season's conclusion, the Detroit Gems (who finished with the league's worst record in its more recent era with a 4–40 record) would have a hard reboot with the team being bought out and moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota to become the Minneapolis Lakers for the next season of play. After that season concluded for them, the Lakers alongside the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons, Indianapolis Kautskys, and Rochester Royals all moved from the NBL to the BAA for the 1948–49 BAA season (though with the Fort Wayne and Indianapolis teams needing name changes as the Fort Wayne Pistons and Indianapolis Jets respectively due to them utilizing business sponsorships for their team names), with both the Oshkosh All-Stars and Toledo Jeeps trying and failing to switch leagues alongside them. Then after the 1948–49 season concluded for both the NBL and BAA, the two leagues would merge operations to form the National Basketball Association, which saw the Anderson Duffey Packers (who rebranded themselves to just the Anderson Packers by then), the Sheboygan Red Skins, the Syracuse Nationals, and Tri-Cities Blackhawks (who had grown more accustomed to their new home venue by then) join the other teams in the NBA as well (though it saw the Indianapolis Jets fold operations by the time of the merger, as well as saw the Oshkosh All-Stars renege on joining the NBA as well). Both Anderson and Sheboygan would only stay in the NBA to play for the 1949–50 NBA season before leaving the league to create their own rivaling professional basketball league (similar to what the Chicago American Gears had done to compete against the NBL) called the National Professional Basketball League (which would not be related to the NPBL that the NBL had been inspired from, as well as ultimately lasted for only one season before being forced to close up operations early). After over a decade in the merger, every surviving NBL team would see themselves move operations within the NBA at least once, yet they'd all still survive to the present day, with the Detroit Gems/Minneapolis Lakers becoming the Los Angeles Lakers, the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons becoming the Detroit Pistons, the Rochester Royals becoming the Sacramento Kings, the Syracuse Nationals becoming the Philadelphia 76ers, and the Buffalo Bisons/Tri-Cities Blackhawks becoming the Atlanta Hawks. As for every other NBL team by this time, while the Oshkosh All-Stars tried to enter the BAA/NBA multiple times and the Toledo Jeeps tried to enter the BAA once, the other four teams would not be around to enter the NBL's merger with the BAA for one reason or another.