Basketball was invented in the late 1800's, but it took until the 1930's for the jump shot to make an appearance. The inventor of the jump shot just happened to be a 5'7" farm boy from Wyoming by the name of Kenny Sailors who started with the shot in high school and worked on it to perfection in college to take the Wyoming Cowboys to a National Championship.

Adding a 36-inch vertical jump to the one-handed shot, along with superb dribbling skills, Sailors went on to become a consensus All-American in 1943, while helping the Cowboys to a 31-2 record and the NCAA title. He averaged 15.1 points per game during the championship season, including a 16-point performance in the Cowboys’ 46-34 victory against  Georgetown in the NCAA title contest at Madison Square Garden. Sailors was named the Most Outstanding Player of the tournament.

The Laramie resident was recently featured in an article by the NCAA celebrating his accomplishments and highlighting his life since then. See the rest of the article here.

See the story about Kenny Sailors here.

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