I am from western Oklahoma, and we didn't start playing full court basketball until 1995.
Sayre, Oklahoma is about an hour from my hometown, and a lot smaller.
I thought all schools in Oklahoma were half court until 1995 or so.
I never heard of any girls only playing half court.
They did in Weatherford, Oklahoma until 1995.
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I went to high school in Oklahoma in the 70s and the girls teams played only half court.
Illigitimi non Carborundum
I hadn't either, until my family moved from L.A. to the rural Texas panhandle. They played six-on-six -- three in frontcourt, three in backcourt -- until the '70s. Same in Oklahoma.
shareI'm in VA and our girls teams were at least playing full court in the 70's because my sister was on the team. With Title IX, you had grounds to protest playing half court for so long.
It was a gradual transition. Oklahoma formed a separate 5x5 league in the mid-80's, and schools were free to play either game for about 10 years. The last half-court games were played in the mid-90's.
shareI graduated from JM in OKC in 1968, and met my first wife at OU. She graduated from Oklahoma Bible Academy in 1971 and led the defense in their 6 on 6 State Championship win over Braman at "the Big House" in OT on 6 Mar 1971. At OU they were playing 5 on 5. Girls in high school in Oklahoma played 6 on 6 into the 1990's.
I believe that Jim Keith's teams were playing half-court but we thought it was just too tough to try to explain to modern audiences what the heck half-court was. Bob Collector, the writer and director, changed the game to full-court, even though it wasn't historically accurate, and told the same story.
shareWe played full court since I started playing back in the 80's for my junior high team. I thought everyschool played full-court basketball, including the girls. I was shocked to find on here that one school didn't start playing until 1995. I'm from Ohio and was surprised to see on the board that Oklahoma was like that., wow.
Kris L. CocKayne
Iowa was one of the last states to stop playing 6 on 6 (aka in this thread "half court"), stopping in 1994, leaving Oklamahoma as the last 6 on 6 state. I don't know about Oklahoma, but in Iowa the larger classes had already switched to five on five by 1994, with just some of the small schools still playing six on six.
The six on six games were basically two separate games of three on three. You were either all-time defense or all-time offense and stayed on your end of the court.
1964-65 was the first year I played basketball, and it was in a small Oklahoma school. I loved half-court; at least the filmmakers got the uniforms right. I loved the movie and am going to add it to our collection.
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