Pittsburgh Condors
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The Pittsburgh Condors were a professional basketball team in the original American Basketball Association, playing under that name from 1970 through 1972. The team played their home games in what is now Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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[edit] Background
The Condors started life as the Pittsburgh Pipers, one of the ABA's inaugural franchises in 1967, and won the league's first championship at the end of the 1967-68 season. They shared the Arena with the city's expansion National Hockey League team, the Pittsburgh Penguins.
However, the Pipers were less successful at the gate than they were on the court, and after their first season they were relocated to Minnesota to play as the Minnesota Pipers. The team was not financially successful there, either. (The Minnesota Muskies had faced problems there during the prior season and thus moved to Miami to become The Floridians.)
The Pipers then returned to Pittsburgh after one season in Minnesota, albeit with almost none of their former on-court success. For the first season back in Pittsburgh the team retained the "Pipers" nickname. However, the team failed to achieve any further on-court success, and after a struggling season the owners decided that a name change was in order. The new name chosen was Condors, and the team competed under this name for two additional seasons (1970-71 and 1971-72) before eventually folding, having failed to regain the championship level of their debut season.
[edit] 1970-1971 season
The team changed its name from the Pittsburgh Pipers to the Pittsburgh Condors prior to the season; the name derived from a contest to name the team. The original contest winner was "Pittsburgh Pioneers" but a local NAIA school using that name threatened litigation and the franchise decided to go with Pittsburgh Condors instead.
Jack McMahon was the coach of the Condors.
John Brisker and Mike Lewis played in the ABA All Star Game. The team finished with a record of 36 wins and 48 losses which placed them in fifth place in the Eastern Division and kept them out of the ABA playoffs. The Condors' average home attendance for the season was 2,806.
[edit] 1971-1972 season
The team's ownership changed but decided to keep the team in Pittsburgh. However, as the season progressed, the Condors began relocating home games, first to other cities in Pennsylvania, and then to farther places. On March 24, 1972 the Condors hosted the Kentucky Colonels in Birmingham, Alabama; on March 28, 1972 the Condors hosted the Colonels again, this time in their last ever 'home' game, in Tuscon, Arizona. (Attendance in both Birmingham and Tuscon was significantly better than the crowds the team drew in Pittsburgh.) John Brisker and George Thompson played in the ABA All Star Game. After starting the season with 21 wins and 53 losses, Jack McMahon was fired as coach and replaced by Mark Binstein for the final ten games of the season. The Condors went 4-6 under Binstein, finishing in sixth place in the Eastern Division at 25-59 and failing to make the playoffs. The Condors averaged 2,215 fans per home game.
[edit] Aftermath
In June of 1972 the ABA announced that it would relocate the Condors to a larger television market; later that month the league bought the franchise and folded it. The Condors' roster was put into a dispersal draft; George Thompson went to the Memphis Tams, Mike Lewis to the Carolina Cougars, Skeeter Swift and James Silas to the Dallas Chaparrals, and Walt Szczerbiak to the Kentucky Colonels. John Brisker jumped to the Seattle Supersonics of the NBA.
[edit] Notable Players
Connie Hawkins, Pro Basketball Hall of Fame
