The 1947 World Professional Basketball Tournament was the ninth edition of the World Professional Basketball Tournament. It was held in Chicago, Illinois, during the days of 7–11 April 1947 and featured 14 teams, with the teams competing there primarily being a mixture of teams from the ever-strong National Basketball League and independently ran teams, with there also being the inclusion of the Baltimore Bullets from the American Basketball League (at the time) and the Portland Indians of the short-lived Pacific Coast Professional Basketball League. Due to a combination of the Chicago American Gears & Rochester Royals declining their invitation to the 1947 event in order to play out the 1947 NBL Championship series they had (before the American Gears later left the NBL to try their hands with a new league of their own in the Professional Basketball League of America (which turned out to be a short-lived league of its own accord)) and the Chicago Stags playing in the 1947 BAA Finals for the inaugural season of the newly-created (yet at the time struggling) Basketball Association of America (now National Basketball Association) to rival the long-standing NBL, local interest in the tournament turned out to wane when compared to prior years (albeit not by a significant amount for the tournament's organizers).[1] However, the event would be notable for seeing the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons failing to win their fourth straight WPBT championship due to them being upset 61-56 by the Toledo Jeeps. Despite the upset that Toledo caused in the semifinal match-up, the championship match would ultimately be won by the Indianapolis Kautskys (who had previously not won a single WPBT match before this year, even in the years where they participated as the Pure Oils and Oilers names during World War II), who defeated the Toledo Jeeps 62–47 in the title game.[2] The Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons came in third after beating the Oshkosh All-Stars 86–67 in the third-place game behind Ralph Hamilton's 26 points.[3] Despite his team not winning this year's event, Julie Rivlin of the Toledo Jeeps was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player.[4]
↑Nelson, Murry R. (2009). The National Basketball League: A History, 1935–1949. McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. ISBN978-0-7864-4006-1., pp. 173–176
↑Triptow, Richard F. (1997). The Dynasty that Never Was: Chicago's First Professional Basketball Champions, The American Gears. Lake Bluff, Illinois: self-published. ISBN0-9659280-0-4., p. 217
