North American Basketball League (1966-1968)
Tombstone
Born: 1966
Died: 1968
First Game:
Last Game:
NABL Championships:
Arena
Branding
Team Colors:
Ownership
Owner: Louis A. Mitchell, et al.
Background
The Columbus (OH) Comets were a minor league pro basketball team that played two seasons in the Midwestern-based North American Basketball League (1964-1968).
The Comets featured several top former Ohio State stars, including Gary Bradds and Mel Nowell. Bradds was a two-time All-America center at OSU and the Associated Press college Player of the Year for 1964. The Baltimore Bullets made Bradds the #3 overall selection in the 1964 NBA draft, but he spent much of the mid-1960’s bouncing around the NABL, which had bus league stops in Illinois, Michigan and Ohio. The Comets sold Bradds’ contract to the Oakland Oaks of the new American Basketball Association in 1967 and he went on to play several seasons in the ABA. Mel Nowell was a veteran of Ohio State’s 1960 NCAA championship team and also later played in the ABA.
The Comets played a short scheduled of just 21 games in 1966-67 and 18 games in 1967-68. Both the Comets and the NABL folded quietly after the 1967-68 season.
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4 Responses
The Columbus Comets played their home games in an old basketball arena on the campus of Ohio State. It’s probably long gone by now.
The Columbus Comets played their home games at the Fairgrounds Coliseum, same facility that the Columbus Chill hockey team played at.
During the 1966-67 season the Comets had a guard by the name of Gene “Stick” Michael, the same Gene Michael that would later play for the New York Yankees, and become their General Manager in the early 1990s.
He had been playing minor league baseball for the Columbus Jets (AAA minor league affiliate of the Pittsburg Pirates at that time) in 1966. Michael had played college basketball at Kent State.
That off season he was traded to the LA Dodgers and after one year traded to the Yankees.
Thank you!
Also, the team’s colors were green & white and the held their pre-season training in 1966 at Rickenbacker AFB on the south side of Columbus.