Back to Indy: You Meet the Nicest People While Hiding in the Basement

One more story from Indianapolis. During the week-end of the NCAA finals, on the evening of Sunday April 2, there was a big storm that I mentioned in an earlier post. Several of our group were coming back from the John Mellencamp concert together and decided it would be a good idea to hang out in the basement of the hotel and play some pool until the storm passed.

Anyway, when we arrived there was another couple hanging out down there with their big ol' black dog. Of course, you can't walk past a dog without petting it and you can't ignore the owner while you are petting his dog. We talked a little bit about the weather and the fact that he was in town for the basketball tourney and the fact that he comes to the finals every year. His name, when we finally got around to exchanging names, was Ian Naismith from Kansas City. I said something like "that's a pretty famous family name from that city." To which he said simply..."yep, I'm one of them".

That was about all at that time...I figured he didn't need to have his celebrity taken advantage of while the wind was trying to blow the building down. So I left him and his girlfriend and his dog alone.

A little while later he came up and asked if I wanted to see the official basketball rules. At that point, I made a brilliant deduction that he was the guy that sat at the scorers table with the official rule book in case the referee's needed to look something up. (Figured it was a ceremonial role or something.) Of course, my reasoning was not really very brilliant...as usual.

He said, "no ....the rules...the original rules of basketball". Turned out, he was carrying in a little gold brief case the 13 original rules of basketball that James Naismith typed out in 1891 and posted on the bulletin board of the YMCA in Springfield, Mass. He opened up the case and, sure enough, there under glass was an old piece of paper that had been typed out and then hand corrected in numerous places.

At this point, everyone had to come take a look and we had a nice chat about Ian's grandfather, the charitable foundations that Ian runs, and his work with the NCAA to try to keep the interpretation of the rules from degrading to the point that basketball becomes a game for thugs. Turns out, he comes to the finals every year to display the rules and keep the memory of James Naismith alive.

The intro picture was taken in the basement of the hotel as the storm was fading. Pictured are Ian Naismith (on the right) and Thomas Veith from Strasbourg. Thomas went to college in the US at Memphis and is a genuine basketball nut. He was thrilled, as you can see from the smile on his face.