NYU Basketball

NYU basketball games drew sell-out crowds to Madison Square Garden, located at 50th Street and Eighth Avenue in 1946. College basketball was immensely popular then. The Basketball Association of America, forerunner of the NBA, was formed later that year by ice hockey arena owners looking to profit on the sport's popularity, Before that professional basketball had been a haphazard affair run by poorly financed individual promoters. The New York Knicks played their first game on November 1.

People were on line by 5 AM the day tickets for the NYU/Notre Dame game went on sale. Fervent Notre Dame fans made up much of the crowd as many of New York's tribal Irish considered Notre Dame their honorary alma mater. The mob grew so large the police were called in to clear the streets for traffic. In an upset, Frank Mangiapane led the NYU Violets to victory over the Fighting Irish. NYU's thirteen-game winning streak came to an end with an upset as well, when CCNY beat them before another sell-out crowd. A thousand CCNY students marched down Fifth Avenue behind a coffin bedecked with NYU pennants. NYU was chosen to play for the NCAA championships, CCNY was not. The highly political City College students staged a protest charging they had been "exploited" by pregame publicity that had claimed that CCNY would get a tournament slot if they won the NYU game. The open slot went instead to Rhode Island, which had a stronger season record. St. John's also represented New York in the tournament. NYU lost to North Carolina in the first round at the Garden.

In 1945 Mimi Sheraton often attended the basketball games with her boyfriend, Irv Hochberg, who had been banned from the Garden for his betting and scalping activities. He always got in anyway. After the games they went to the nearby Hotel Belvedere where the gamblers and bookies settled their scores.