Championship Basketball with Henry Iba at OAMC: Home

About the Collection

In December 1946, the Association Films (Y.M.C.A. Motion Picture Bureau) released the Play Championship Basketball, a series of instructional films depicting different topics on the fundamentals of basketball. It was a demonstration of styles and plays by the team from the Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College (OAMC), consisting of approaches to individual offense, individual defense, team styles of play, disciplined defensive styles, drills, and Henry Iba's famous ball security and motion offensive plays and variations.

The source materials given to the OSU Library Archives were 35 mm Eastman nitrate films from 1946. They illustrate the work of a nationally recognized coaching giant, Henry Payne Iba (1904-1993). Henry Iba started his coaching career at the age of 22, coaching at the Maryville Teachers College and at the University of Colorado before continuing his coaching career over 36 seasons at OAMC until his retirement.

It was a great opportunity to digitally preserve this time capsule of sorts as it represents a crucial time in the history of basketball as a whole, as well as the history of the OAMC Aggies teams portrayed in those films.

About the Digitization Process

The original films were in a nitrate format, which is highly unstable. The OSU Library was able to digitally convert the material for both preservation and safety purposes. Many thanks for the grant support by the National Film Preservation Foundation, a federally supported preservation grant program. NFPF is the nonprofit organization created by the U.S. Congress to help save America's film heritage. They support activities nationwide that preserve American films and improve film access for study, education and exhibition.

Special thanks to the NFPF grant, during OSHA’s Safe and Sound Week in fall 2019, the OSU Library was publicly recognized for its work to remove unstable, flammable films from its archive, while preserving historic treasures.

The film can be viewed at the Archives by appointment. Please email Ben Hedges or contact us at 405-744-6311.

The Archives at the OSU Library
204 Edmon Low Library
Oklahoma State University
Stillwater, OK 74078
405-744-6311 or email