1955-56 NBA Finals
March 31, 1956 – April 7, 1956
1955-56 NBA Finals result: PWPhiladelphia Warriors def. FWPFort Wayne Pistons, 4-1, March 31, 1956 – April 7, 1956.
Result
| Team | Series | |
|---|---|---|
| Champion | PWPhiladelphia Warriors | 4-1 |
| Runner-up | FWPFort Wayne Pistons |
Games
| Game | Date | Result | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Game 1 | March 31, 1956 | PWPhiladelphia Warriors 98–94 Fort Wayne Pistons | Convention Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Game 2 | April 1, 1956 | FWPFort Wayne Pistons 84–83 Philadelphia Warriors | War Memorial Coliseum, Fort Wayne, Indiana |
| Game 3 | April 3, 1956 | PWPhiladelphia Warriors 100–96 Fort Wayne Pistons | Convention Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Game 4 | April 5, 1956 | PWPhiladelphia Warriors 107–105 Fort Wayne Pistons | War Memorial Coliseum, Fort Wayne, Indiana |
| Game 5 | April 7, 1956 | PWPhiladelphia Warriors 99–88 Fort Wayne Pistons | Convention Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Finals MVP
The Finals MVP award was not introduced until 1969; no Finals MVP was named for this series.
Series context
The 1955-56 NBA Finals featured the Philadelphia Warriors, who finished the regular season 45-27 atop the Eastern Division, against the Fort Wayne Pistons, who won the Western Division at 37-35, the only team in that division to finish above .500. This was the second season with the 24-second shot clock in place, and scoring across the league remained significantly higher than in the pre-clock era. Notably, this was the first Finals since George Mikan's original retirement after the 1954 championship in which the legendary center was not the central figure of the Lakers, though Mikan briefly and unsuccessfully returned to Minneapolis as a part-time player partway through this very 1955-56 season; the Lakers, however, did not make the Finals that year, with Clyde Lovellette serving as the team's primary scorer instead. Both finalists needed the full length of a hard-fought division final to get there: Philadelphia beat Syracuse 3-2 in the Eastern Division Finals after the Nationals had upset Boston in the semifinals, while Fort Wayne beat St. Louis 3-2 in the Western Division Finals after the Hawks had eliminated Minneapolis, meaning both the eventual champion Warriors and the runner-up Pistons had to survive a full five-game division final just to reach the championship round. Philadelphia, led by high-scoring forward Paul Arizin along with Neil Johnston, one of the league's most dominant post scorers of the era, took control of the series from the outset. The Warriors won Game 1 at home, 98-94, then dropped Game 2 in a narrow 84-83 loss to Fort Wayne, evening the series at one game apiece. Philadelphia then reeled off three straight victories to close out the championship: a 100-96 win in Game 3, a tight 107-105 victory in Game 4, and a series-clinching 99-88 win in Game 5, giving the Warriors the title in five games. A distinctive feature of this Finals was its scheduling format: rather than following a traditional home-and-away pattern, the two teams alternated home games throughout the series, a format used in only one other Finals in NBA history (1971). Arizin led all scorers throughout the playoffs, and the championship gave the Warriors their first title since 1947 (when the franchise won the inaugural BAA championship). Fort Wayne, led by George Yardley and Larry Foust, fell short in a second consecutive Finals appearance, having lost the epic seven-game series to Syracuse the previous year. This series took place during a transitional period for the league, still just two seasons removed from the shot-clock revolution, as the balance of power in the NBA was shifting away from the Mikan-led Minneapolis dynasty toward a new generation of stars.
Sources
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
← Basketball · Champions list · All-time records · Season standings · All competitions · Teams · Players