American Basketball Association (ABA)
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50 free American Basketball Association (ABA) trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
For nine seasons the American Basketball Association was the NBA's loud, broke and inventive rival. It signed players the older league would not touch, handed teenagers professional contracts, tried rules and showmanship nobody else dared, and moved or folded franchises almost every year before forcing a merger in 1976. This quiz covers the whole ride: the Most Valuable Players and scoring leaders, the champions, the commissioners and coaches, the owners who came from show business and baseball, the clubs that vanished, and the deals that still shape the NBA. It suits fans who remember the league, NBA followers curious about where so much of the modern sport came from, and quiz hosts who want accurate questions with answers. Every question has a short explanation, so a miss still leaves you with a story.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What three colors made up the distinctive ball the American Basketball Association used from 1967 to 1976?
Red, white and blue
Red, white and blue looked more patriotic and more crowd-pleasing than the NBA's brown ball, the league's first commissioner argued. The NBA's Three-Point Contest later borrowed the design for its bonus 'money ball'.
Q 02Which 2008 Will Ferrell comedy follows the Flint Tropics, a fictional ABA team chasing a place in the NBA?
Semi-Pro
Semi-Pro casts Ferrell as Jackie Moon, a one-hit-wonder singer who is the Tropics' owner, head coach and starting power forward at once. Woody Harrelson and André 3000 co-star.
Q 03Which NBA great became coach of the ABA's San Diego Conquistadors in 1973 after a lawsuit stopped him playing?
Wilt Chamberlain
Wilt Chamberlain was paid $600,000 to be player-coach, but his old club, the Lakers, sued to keep him off the court. He once skipped a game to sign copies of his autobiography.
Q 04Which rule did the American Basketball Association use from its first season, twelve years before the NBA adopted it?
The three-point shot
The three-point shot had been tried by the short-lived American Basketball League in 1961, but the ABA made it famous. The NBA finally added the arc in autumn 1979.
Q 05Which crowd-pleasing event did the ABA stage for the first time at halftime of its 1976 All-Star Game in Denver?
A slam dunk contest
A slam dunk contest was added to thrill a sellout crowd, and Julius Erving won it by taking off from the free-throw line. First prize was $1,000 and a stereo system.
Q 06The owners of the folded Spirits of St. Louis collected a share of which NBA income for nearly four decades?
Television revenue
Television revenue from each of the four surviving ABA teams, a one-seventh share, went to brothers Ozzie and Daniel Silna in perpetuity. In 2014 the NBA paid them a $500 million lump sum to end most of the payments.
Q 07Which 1950s pop singer served as president and part-owner of the ABA's Oakland Oaks?
Pat Boone
Pat Boone started with a 10 percent share and rarely attended home games. He ended up as majority owner of a club that won the 1969 title yet failed at the box office.
Q 08Which future NBA MVP jumped straight from high school to the ABA's Utah Stars in 1974?
Moses Malone
Moses Malone was only a third-round ABA draft pick, yet he became the first player in modern professional basketball to turn pro directly from high school.
Q 09Which NBA team bought ABA star Julius Erving's contract for $3 million in 1976, right after the two leagues merged?
Philadelphia 76ers
Philadelphia 76ers money roughly covered what the Nets owed to enter the NBA. The Knicks had earlier turned down Erving's contract in place of a territorial payment.
Q 10Which American Basketball Association team won the most championships, taking three titles between 1970 and 1973?
Indiana Pacers
Indiana Pacers teams reached the ABA Finals five times in nine seasons, a league record. They and the Kentucky Colonels were the only clubs to play all nine seasons without moving or changing names.
Q 11Which ABA guard nicknamed 'the Iceman' went on to win four NBA scoring titles after the 1976 merger?
George Gervin
George Gervin earned the name for his cool demeanor on the court. He sealed his first NBA scoring crown in 1978 by pouring in 63 points in the final game of the season.
Q 12Which UCLA center, drafted first by both leagues in 1969, turned down the ABA's Nets to join the Milwaukee Bucks?
Lew Alcindor
Lew Alcindor, later Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, said he would hear one offer per team and found the Nets' too low. Their improved $3.25 million bid came after he had chosen Milwaukee.
Q 13Which future NBC sportscaster was the radio voice of the ABA's Spirits of St. Louis from 1974 to 1976?
Bob Costas
Q 21With which ABA team did Julius Erving begin his professional career in 1971 after leaving college early?
Virginia Squires
Virginia Squires home games were spread across Norfolk, Richmond, Hampton and Roanoke. The cash-strapped club sold its stars one by one and folded a month before the 1976 merger.
Q 22Which center, the ABA's all-time leading rebounder, was the first player to win the league's MVP award twice?
Mel Daniels
Mel Daniels took the award in 1969 and 1971 and won three championships. Only Julius Erving, with three, ever collected more of the ABA's MVP trophies.
Q 23Which NBA forward nicknamed 'the Kangaroo Kid' jumped to the Carolina Cougars and was the ABA's MVP in 1973?
Billy Cunningham
Bob Costas joined KMOX radio straight after leaving school and called the Spirits for both of their seasons. He then covered Missouri Tigers basketball for the same station.
Q 14Which former Harlem Globetrotter, blackballed by the NBA, was the ABA's first MVP and led Pittsburgh to the first title?
Connie Hawkins
Connie Hawkins had been falsely implicated in a point-shaving scandal as an Iowa freshman, when he was not even eligible to play. His antitrust lawsuit later forced the NBA to admit him.
Q 15Which Warriors star, famous for underhand free throws, jumped to the ABA's Oakland Oaks but had to sit out a season?
Rick Barry
Rick Barry lost in court when judges upheld the reserve clause in his Warriors contract. Baseball's Curt Flood took his own challenge of the clause to the Supreme Court a few years later.
Q 16Which 1968 Olympic gold medalist left college early and was the ABA's MVP as a rookie in 1970?
Spencer Haywood
Spencer Haywood signed with the Denver Rockets under a hardship exemption after his sophomore year at the University of Detroit. The NBA soon relaxed its own four-year college rule.
Q 17Which 7-foot-2 center nicknamed 'the A-Train' was both Rookie of the Year and MVP for the Kentucky Colonels in 1972?
Artis Gilmore
Artis Gilmore once played 670 games in a row. When the Colonels folded in 1976, the Chicago Bulls claimed him in the dispersal draft of players from the clubs left out of the NBA.
Q 18Which bespectacled former Minneapolis Lakers center served as the first commissioner of the ABA?
George Mikan
George Mikan resigned in 1969, but he was not done with the sport. In the 1980s he led the task force that brought pro basketball back to Minneapolis with the Timberwolves.
Q 19Which NC State star nicknamed 'Skywalker' was drafted first by both leagues in 1975 and chose the ABA's Nuggets?
David Thompson
David Thompson was named Rookie of the Year and MVP of the 1976 ABA All-Star Game. Dunking was outlawed in college then, so the only dunk of his NC State career cost him a technical foul.
Q 20The ABA's Spirits of St. Louis took their name from the plane flown across the Atlantic by which aviator?
Charles Lindbergh
Charles Lindbergh made the transatlantic flight solo, and the team simply made his plane's name plural. The club was the old Carolina Cougars, sold to New York investors in 1974.
Billy Cunningham earned the name for his leaping at North Carolina. He signed with the Cougars in 1969, tried to stay in the NBA, and joined them only after an appeals court ruled for the ABA club in 1972.
Q 24Which forward who grew up in Indianapolis shared the 1975 ABA MVP award with Julius Erving?
George McGinnis
George McGinnis averaged a career-high 29.8 points that season and had been playoffs MVP in 1973. He later said football was probably his best sport, though he liked it less.
Q 25Which former Knicks forward, once a Chicago White Sox pitcher, was the last commissioner of the ABA?
Dave DeBusschere
Dave DeBusschere moved up from general manager of the Nets to run the league in its final season and helped steer the merger. At 24 he had been the NBA's youngest-ever coach.
Q 26Which forward nicknamed 'the Horse' led the ABA in scoring as a rookie in 1971 and later coached the Denver Nuggets?
Dan Issel
Dan Issel earned the name by missing only 24 games in 15 seasons. As a coach in 1994, his Nuggets became the first eighth seed to knock a top seed out of the NBA playoffs.
Q 27Which Kentucky Colonels guard scored more points than anyone else in ABA history and played in all nine seasons?
Louie Dampier
Louie Dampier also tops the ABA's all-time lists for games, minutes and assists. He was the only player to appear in the playoffs in every one of the league's nine years.
Q 28Which future Hall of Fame coach was named MVP of the first ABA All-Star Game as a guard in 1968?
Larry Brown
Larry Brown led the ABA in assists in each of its first three seasons and set its single-game record with 23. He later became the only coach to win both NCAA and NBA titles.
Q 29Which Spirits of St. Louis star nicknamed 'Bad News' was the ABA's Rookie of the Year in 1975?
Marvin Barnes
Marvin Barnes once refused to board a flight that was due to land, by the clock, before it took off, thanks to a time-zone change. He rented a car instead.
Q 30Which NBA players' union president filed the 1970 antitrust lawsuit that delayed the ABA–NBA merger for six years?
Oscar Robertson
Oscar Robertson also attacked the college draft and the clause tying a player to one team for life. The 1976 settlement cleared the way for the merger and for modern NBA free agency.