Western Division (NBA)
The Western Division was a division in the National Basketball Association and its forerunner, the Basketball Association of America. The division was created at the start of the 1946–47 BAA season, when the league was created, and was then kept as one of the divisions when BAA merged with the National Basketball League to create the NBA on August 3, 1949. Originally, when the merger between the BAA and NBL happened, it was planned for the Western and Eastern divisions to be renamed into the American and National divisions with the divisions being re-divided between the Western and Eastern teams in both leagues not long afterward, but the sudden dropout of the Oshkosh All-Stars from the initial BAA–NBL merger into the NBA by September 3, 1949, led to the Western and Eastern divisions returning as planned alongside the temporary creation of a Central Division for that season. The division existed until the 1970–71 NBA season when the NBA expanded from 14 to 17 teams and realigned into the Eastern and Western conferences with two divisions each.
Teams
;Notes- denotes an expansion team.
- denotes a team that merged from the National Basketball League
Team timeline
DateFormat = yyyy
ImageSize = width:1150 height:auto barincrement:25
Period = from:1946 till:1970
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal
PlotArea = right:60 left:20 bottom:20 top:0
Colors = id:barcolor value:rgb
id:line value:black
id:bg value:white
PlotData =
width:15 textcolor:black shift: anchor:from fontsize:s
bar:1 color:tan1 from:1946 till:1949 text:Chicago Stags
bar:2 color:tan2 from:1946 till:1947 text:Cleveland Rebels
bar:3 color:tan2 from:1946 till:1947 text:Detroit Falcons
bar:4 color:tan2 from:1946 till:1947 text:Pittsburgh Ironmen
bar:5 color:tan1 from:1946 till:1949 text:St. Louis Bombers
bar:6 color:tan1 from:1947 till:1948 text:Baltimore Bullets
bar:7 color:tan1 from:1947 till:1948 text:Washington Capitols
bar:8 color:tan2 from:1948 till:1949 text:Indianapolis Jets
bar:9 color:tan1 from:1948 till:1949 text:Rochester Royals/Cincinnati Royals
bar:9 color:tan1 from:1950 till:1962
bar:10 color:tan1 from:1948 till:1949 text:Fort Wayne Pistons/Detroit Pistons
bar:10 color:tan1 from:1950 till:1967
bar:11 color:tan1 from:1948 till:1949 text:Minneapolis Lakers/Los Angeles Lakers
bar:11 color:tan1 from:1950 till:1970
bar:12 color:tan1 from:1949 till:1950 text:Anderson Packers
bar:13 color:tan1 from:1949 till:1970 text:Tri-Cities Blackhawks/Milwaukee Hawks/St. Louis Hawks/Atlanta Hawks
bar:14 color:tan2 from:1949 till:1950 text:Denver Nuggets
bar:15 color:tan2 from:1949 till:1953 text:Indianapolis Olympians
bar:16 color:tan1 from:1949 till:1950 text:Sheboygan Red Skins
bar:17 color:tan1 from:1949 till:1950 text:Waterloo Hawks
bar:18 color:tan1 from:1961 till:1966 text:Chicago Packers/Chicago Zephyrs/Baltimore Bullets
bar:19 color:tan1 from:1962 till:1970 text:San Francisco Warriors
bar:20 color:tan1 from:1966 till:1970 text:Chicago Bulls
bar:21 color:tan1 from:1967 till:1970 text:San Diego Rockets
bar:22 color:tan1 from:1967 till:1970 text:Seattle SuperSonics
bar:23 color:tan1 from:1968 till:1970 text:Phoenix Suns
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