AND AT CENTER, BILL RUSSELL... FORMER MINNESOTA LAKERS EXECUTIVE RECALLS WORKING ON DEAL TO GET HIS DRAFT RIGHTS.

Byline: Matthew Kredell Staff Writer

Showtime almost was a dream, Magic never a reality. The Bill Russell-Wilt Chamberlain rivalry nearly had a different twist. It seems farfetched now, but the Lakers were close to staying in Minneapolis.

Sid Hartman had a plan that he swears to this day would have kept the Lakers near the lakes. The executive of the Minneapolis Lakers worked out a trade during the 1955-56 season.

With the retirement of George Mikan, the Lakers were struggling. Their one remaining star player was power forward Vern Mikkelsen. Hartman would trade Mikkelsen to Boston for Frank Ramsey, Cliff Hagan and Lou Tsioropoulos, all of whom were serving in the military at the time and wouldn't be able to play that year.

Hartman said he designed the trade so the Lakers, without Mikkelsen, could finish last and receive the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft, which he would use on Russell.

``The trade was all drawn up,'' Hartman said. ``I still have the papers. Russell had been contacted and was telling people he was going to be drafted by the Lakers.''

With Russell aboard, Hartman said the Lakers could get the new arena they needed to be financially profitable in Minneapolis.

But Mikkelsen and coach John Kundla argued against the trade, and it was nixed by owner Ben Berger. The Lakers finished third to last (in an eight-team league) and watched St. Louis take Russell with the second pick, then trade him to Boston. The Celtics went on to win eight championships.

``He said he wanted to trade Mikkelsen so we could finish in the basement and get Russell,'' Kundla said. ``I objected and Mikkelsen objected. I still think it was the right thing to do. As a coach, you never think of losing games on purpose.''

Hartman said he was trying to do what was best for the team. When the deal was overruled, he quit.

``We would have won it with Russell and those three guys,'' Hartman said. ``The Lakers wouldn't have gone to Los Angeles. Los Angeles would have eventually gotten some team but not the Lakers.''

This is just one of many nuggets from the Lakers' time in the Twin Cities. A look back at the franchise's colorful history before the move west:

Writer starts team

Minneapolis had no professional sports teams in 1947. Instead of complaining, one sportswriter took action.

Hartman, who today is a columnist for the Minneapolis Star Tribune at age 83, appealed to two local businessmen and organized the purchase of the Detroit Gems for $1,500. The fledgling National Basketball League (NBL) team went to Minneapolis without players. The price was basically for a spot in the league.

The renamed Minneapolis Lakers went from having no players to winning titles in six of its first seven years. Luck obviously played a part. When the Chicago Gears folded after winning the NBL title in 1947, players on the Gears went into a dispersal draft and, because the Gems finished last in 1947, the Lakers had the first pick. They selected Mikan, and the Lakers were on their way.

``I did it all,'' Hartman said. ``It was my idea and I got some businessmen involved. I was working at the paper, we had no pro sports teams and this was a way to get one. It was a different world. Now, everything is a conflict of interest. Then, every sportswriter had a PR job.''

Final score: 19-18

Fans went to Minneapolis Auditorium on Nov. 22, 1950 expecting a good show and another dominant performance from their Lakers, who were on a 30-game winning streak at the arena.

The Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons had other ideas. Knowing his team had no chance to beat the Lakers in a normal game, Pistons coach Murray Mendenhall stalled. Players held the ball for minutes at a time, not dribbling, just standing there. The crowd booed, but the Pistons persisted. And it worked. Pistons center Larry Foust scored over Mikan in the final seconds for a 19-18 victory. It is the lowest-scoring game in NBA history.

``It never should have been done,'' Mikkelsen said. ``It was a full house at Minneapolis Auditorium and a lot of people said they never were going to go to a game again.''

Owners met and made an oral agreement not to use the stalling tactics again. Then, four years later, the 24-second clock was enacted.

High jump

Thanks to the Minneapolis Lakers, Shaquille O'Neal never will have to deal with one theory to limit his dominance.

In 1954, basketball purists were looking for a way to lessen the importance of height. The NBA used a regular-season game between the Lakers and Milwaukee Hawks in Minneapolis to test 12-foot-high baskets instead of the regulation 10 feet. The Lakers won 65-63 and the NBA saw an unexpected result.

``It was terrible,'' Mikkelsen said. ``It was a total mistake. The first we heard of it was after arriving by train from a two-week road trip. They believed they were giving the little guys more of a chance. What happened was it was the biggest night I ever had because I had another two feet to get a hold of the ball.''

Any ideas of raising the basket were quickly forgotten.

Into the NBA

After one season in the NBL, the Lakers were persuaded to lead three other teams in a move over to a competing league, the Basketball Association of America.

Without its defending champion and top players, the NBL couldn't survive and merged with the BAA in 1949 to form the NBA. Had the Lakers remained in the NBL, the league might have resisted and the NBA never formed.

``There is something to that,'' Hartman said. ``At the very least, the merger would have been delayed.''

Power forward

Basketball teams used to have one giant, surrounded by small guards and forwards.

Then the Lakers drafted Mikkelsen, a 6-foot-7 center from Hamline University in St. Paul. He was too good to back up Mikan, so the Lakers started Mikkelsen on a wing and the power-forward position was born.

``Before that, nobody ever thought of playing two big guys like that,'' Hartman said. ``Most teams didn't even have two big guys.''

Handling Harlem

When the Lakers were founded, the Harlem Globetrotters weren't the novelty act they are today. They were the best basketball team in the world.

Then the Lakers won the all-white NBL championship in 1948 and challenged the Globetrotters and their 103-game winning streak. The Globetrotters won at the buzzer on a 20-foot jumper by Ermer Robinson.

The next year, the Globetrotters again beat a short-handed Lakers team before Minneapolis broke through for six victories in a row over the next eight years, five by double-digits. By then the NBA had been integrated.

``I had nothing but respect for those people,'' said Mikkelsen, who wasn't yet part of the Lakers during the two losses. ``They finally had to quit because they really couldn't compete. But it was always fun. They were the most entertaining game in the sport.''

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After a proposed deal by the Minnesota Lakers to acquire Bill Russell went awry, the center signs with the Boston Celtics.

Associated Press