1947–48 Tri-Cities Blackhawks season

The 1947–48 season was the Tri-Cities Blackhawks' second season in the National Basketball League (NBL) and its first full season in Moline, Illinois under the Tri-Cities Blackhawks name. The Blackhawks moved from the Eastern Division to the Western Division; the team finished .500 and qualified for postseason play for the first time.^[1]

• Won Opening Round (Indianapolis Kautskys) 3–1
• Lost Division Semifinals (Minneapolis Lakers) 0–2

• Don Otten – All-NBL Second Team
• Robert McDermott – All-NBL Second Team^[2]

For the second and final time in franchise history, shortly prior to the NBL Finals beginning, during the days of April 8-11, 1948, the Tri-Cities Blackhawks would participate in the World Professional Basketball Tournament in Chicago (this time feeling much more comfortable with their position as a franchise than they were the previous season), with the final event ever held seeing the final eight teams participating mostly consisting of teams from the National Basketball League for a change of pace, with the only other professional team competing being the Wilkes-Barre Barons of the American Basketball League (who competed against the technically newly-formed Minneapolis Lakers in the quarterfinal round) and the only two independently ran teams being the New York Renaissance and the Bridgeport Newfields, who competed against each other in the quarterfinal round. Initially, there was supposed to have been a championship series between the champions of the National Basketball League (which became the Lakers) and the newly-rivaling Basketball Association of America (which were formerly the older rivaling American Basketball League's own Baltimore Bullets, which was also the BAA's original Baltimore Bullets franchise) in 1948, but that ultimately never came to fruition. In the quarterfinal round, the Blackhawks went up against the long-time competing Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons, who still remained a threat despite no longer being defending WPBT champions. However, due to the leadership of player-coach Bobby McDermott (a former Zollner Pistons player himself), he would help the Blackhawks upset the Zollner Pistons with a 57–50 win to end Fort Wayne's WPBT history in the tournament.

In the semifinal round, the Blackhawks saw themselves go up against the sole surviving independently ran team of the WPBT, the all-black, long-standing New York Renaissance. McDermott's leadership and experience in the WPBT would help the Blackhawks keep things close with the Rens, but the New York squad (being led by Nat Clifton for the All-Tournament First Team and multi-athlete George Crowe for the All-Tournament Second Team) proved to be too much for the Tri-Cities squad, as the Renaissance eliminated the Blackhawks 59–55 from championship play and the Tri-Cities had to settle for a chance at a third place finish by facing off against the losing squad between the Minneapolis Lakers and the Anderson Duffey Packers instead.

For the final third place consolation prize match in WPBT history, the Tri-Cities Blackhawks saw themselves go up against the Anderson Duffey Packers, missing out on facing off against star center George Mikan entirely in this tournament. Despite that fact, the Blackhawks did keep things evened up with the Duffey Packers for the first half of the match (being tied 27–27 by halftime) before Anderson heated things up in the second half with Ralph Johnson and Rollie Seltz leading the charge for 39 second half points to have the Tri-Cities lose 66–44, denying them a third place finish in the final WPBT ever tournament.^[3] Despite failing to place, Bobby McDermott was named a member of the All-Tournament Second Team.

• Won quarterfinal round (57–50) over the Fort Wayne Zollner Pistons
• Lost semifinal round (55–59) to the New York Renaissance
• Lost third place consolation prize match (44–66) to the Anderson Duffey Packers

• Bobby McDermott, All-Tournament Second Team