The Daring Book for Girls
Chapter One
Rules of the Game: Basketball
Basketball was first played with a soccer ball and a suspended wooden peach basket when it was invented in 1891 by Dr. James Naismith at a YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. Girls originally shot hoops wearing Victorian petticoats, white muslin pinafores, and silk slippers. The dress code has thankfully changed, and basketball today is one of the few team sports that a girl can not only learn in elementary school but also dream of playing professionallly.
Basketball opened up to girls—real uniforms and all—in the 1970s. The United States passed a law known popularly as "Title IX" (the full name is Title IX of the Education Amendment of 1972), which said that no one, girls or boys, can be excluded from participating in school activities if that school receives federal funds. Some schools resisted, but many more decided to open up team sports to girls. As a result of Title IX, girls can now play sports at all school levels, and college women's basketball in particular has become a popular sport to watch and play.
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