Summary
The Tri-Cities Blackhawks moved to Milwaukee and became the Hawks before the season opened, but for the first time the NBA still had the same franchises with which it had closed the previous season.
The league did make one major rules changes, its first real departure from the rules used in college basketball: The free-throw lane was widened from 6 to 12 feet, mainly to keep George Mikan farther away from the basket.
Largely because of that change, Mikan's scoring average dropped by 4.6 points per game and he failed to win the scoring title for the first time since he'd entered the NBA. Paul Arizin, a jump-shooting forward, led the league with a 25.4 average and, remarkably, was also the league leader in field goal percentage.
Mikan was the league's top rebounder, though, and Andy Phillip of Philadelphia led in assists for the second straight year.
The Lakers finished a game behind the Rochester Royals in the Western Division, but they eliminated the Royals, 3 games to 1, in the division's playoff finals.
In the East, the third-place New York Knicks won a double-overtime battle to eliminate the Boston Celtics in the first round and then upset the first-place Syracuse Nationals in four games to reach the finals.
For the second year in a row, the championship series went seven games. After being hard pressed by the Knicks through the first six games, two of which went into overtime, the Lakers took an easy victory in the final game to win their fourth championship in five years.
