1977–78 NBA season

Updated on Sep 22, 2024

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Sport Basketball Eastern champions Washington Bullets Western champions Seattle SuperSonics Start date 1977 Number of teams 22		TV partner(s) CBS Eastern runners-up Philadelphia 76ers Champion Washington Wizards Number of games 82 Top seed Portland Trail Blazers
League National Basketball Association Top scorer George Gervin (San Antonio Spurs) Season MVP Bill Walton (Portland Trail Blazers)

The 1977–78 NBA season was the 32nd season of the National Basketball Association. The season ended with the Washington Bullets winning the NBA Championship, beating the Seattle SuperSonics 4 games to 3 in the NBA Finals.

Notable occurrences

The New York Nets move from Uniondale, New York to Piscataway, New Jersey, and are renamed the New Jersey Nets. The New York Knicks, who forced the Nets to pay $4.8 million for invading the New York area prior to the previous season, remained the only NBA team in New York for 35 years, until the Nets moved to Brooklyn in the 2012–13 season.

The 1978 NBA All-Star Game was played at the Omni Coliseum in Atlanta, with the East beating the West 133-125. Randy Smith of the Buffalo Braves wins the game's MVP award.

The defending champion Portland Trail Blazers went off to a 50–10 start and looked poised to repeat, but Bill Walton broke his foot (the first of the numerous major injuries that radically shortened his career) and was out for the remainder of the season. The Blazers, hurt by Walton's absence and by other key injuries, faded to an 8–14 finish and lost to the Sonics in the Western Conference semifinals.

On December 9, 1977, Kermit Washington punched Houston Rockets player Rudy Tomjanovich in the face during an NBA game. Tomjanovich was seriously injured and missed the rest of the season. Washington was subsequently fined $10,000 and suspended 26 games by the NBA.

Throughout the 1977–78 season, CBS broadcast NBA games during the regular season and the playoffs. During halftime of those games, they showed a pre-taped H–O–R–S–E tournament pitting players from the NBA against each other. It featured, among others, Pete Maravich, Bob McAdoo, Kevin Grevey, and George Gervin. Maravich won the contest, but H–O–R–S–E featuring NBA players would not be re-instituted for 31 more years (until the 2009 All-Star Weekend).

This was the first season since the 1949–50 season that no Boston Celtics player was named to either the First or Second All-NBA Team.

Notes

z, y – division champions

x – clinched playoff spot