1943–44 Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons season

The 1943–44 Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons season was the third season of the franchise in the National Basketball League. The Pistons entered the season with the big three of league MVP Bobby McDermott, Buddy Jeanette and Jake Pelkington and off of two straight losses in the championship series. The team finished the season 18–4 and defeated the Cleveland Chase Brassmen in the first round in a two-game sweep to earn their third straight finals birth and a rematch of last year against the Sheboygan Red Skins. From there the Pistons swept the Red Skins in 3 games to win their first NBL Championship.

In addition to the NBL Playoffs, the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons also participated in the World Professional Basketball Tournament as well. The Zollner Pistons would not compete against any other NBL teams in the 1944 event; they instead competed against the independently ran Dayton Aviators and New York Renaissance before competing in the championship match against the rivaling American Basketball League's Brooklyn Eagles. Their toughest match would come against the Renaissance in the semifinal round; the other two matches Fort Wayne had would result in them blowing out their opponents in order to get their first WPBT championship alongside their first NBL championship.

• Robert McDermott was league leader is field goals made with 123. He was also the MVP of the season.
• Robert McDermott, First Team All-NBL
• Jake Pelkington, Second Team All-NBL

For the fourth year in a row (third in a row while representing the NBL), the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons would participate in the annual World Professional Basketball Tournament in Chicago, which the 1944 event was held on March 20–24, 1944 and was mostly held by independently ran teams alongside the four NBL teams that remained by this time due in part to World War II. The Zollner Pistons were given a first round bye alongside the Sheboygan Red Skins due to them being the best teams in the NBL this season. The first match that Fort Wayne competed in was against the independently ran Dayton Aviators (who were ran by players stationed at the Wright Field in Riverside, Ohio), who the Zollner Pistons crushed 59–34 for what was their own first round match-up.^[2]

In the semifinal round, Fort Wayne competed against the New York Renaissance, who returned to the event as the Renaissance after previously not entering the event under that name the previous year (though members of that team would compete in the tournament while under the Washington Bears name, who were the last independent team to win the event altogether). The Renaissance would prove to hold a formidable challenge to the Zollner Pistons in the semifinal round, though Fort Wayne would upset the independent New York team by a close 42–38 victory in their favor, ending the Renaissance's chances to technically repeat as WPBT champions if we count the previous year's event for the Washington Bears as the Rens competing under that name instead.^[3]

For the championship match, the Zollner Pistons saw themselves go up against the surprise team of the event, the Brooklyn Eagles, who were rebranded from their original Brooklyn Indians name and composed of star players from the rivaling American Basketball League, instead of a team like the Harlem Globetrotters or one of the remaining NBL teams. Regardless, Fort Wayne only saw the Eagles as legitimate competition for one quarter before nearly shutting them out in the second quarter and subsequently routing them 50–33 in the championship game, being the second NBL team to win championships in both the NBL and WPBT in the same season behind the 1941–42 Oshkosh All-Stars in 1942. Bobby McDermott was subsequently named the tournament's MVP, with him and two other Zollner Pistons also being named onto the All-Tournament Team listings.^[4]

• Fort Wayne had a bye in the first round.
• Won quarterfinal round (59–34) over Dayton Aviators
• Won semifinal round (42–38) over New York Renaissance
• Won championship round (50–33) over Brooklyn Eagles

• Bobby McDermott, All-Tournament First Team, MVP
• Blackie Towery, All-Tournament First Team
• Jerry Bush, All-Tournament Second Team