The 24-Second Shot Clock
1954 to 1955 season. Danny Biasone saves the NBA from stalling
In the early 1950s, NBA games could be painfully slow. A team with the lead could simply hold the ball, and opponents fouled on purpose to get it back. Fans were losing interest.
Danny Biasone, owner of the Syracuse Nationals, did some simple math. Teams took about 60 shots each in a 48-minute game. Two teams together, 120 shots, spread over 2,880 seconds, worked out to one shot every 24 seconds. So he proposed giving each team 24 seconds to shoot.
The NBA adopted the shot clock for the 1954 to 1955 season. Scoring jumped from 79.5 to 93.1 points per team per game, and Biasone's own Nationals won the title that season.
What changed
Stalling with a lead was over. Every possession now had a deadline, so teams had to build offenses that created a good shot quickly, and defenses learned that making the offense use the full clock was a weapon in itself.