1947–48 Washington Capitols season

The 1947–48 BAA season was the Capitols' second season in the BAA (which later became the NBA).^[1] Entering this season, the Capitols were expected to be among the elite teams of the BAA this season in spite of them moving from the Eastern Division to the Western Division following the addition of the original Baltimore Bullets and folding of four of the BAA's inaugural teams, with legendary head coach Red Auerbach being given another one-year contract by team owner Mike Uline due to the latter's prior bad experience with multi-year contracts. However, despite them retaining Auerbach's services and retaining most of their roster while maintaining the same "midseason" conditioning plan from the previous season into this season, the Capitols would end up downgrading their results throughout the season with a 28–20 record, being behind the St. Louis Bombers for a first place finish and being tied with both the former ABL-born Baltimore Bullets and the Chicago Stags for the final two playoff spots in the Western Division, which led to a unique Western Division tiebreaker period where Washington and Chicago would compete against each other once again, but in a winner-takes-all match for one of the playoff spots in the Western Division, with Baltimore automatically qualifying for the other spot by default. Disappointingly, Washington would lose to Chicago once again, this time being defeated 74–70 to be eliminated from playoff contention entirely this season. Following this elimination, Auerbach would be given one more one-year contract by Mike Uline due to Auerbach losing some ground in his negotiations at the time, with the upcoming season looking to be a "prove-it" season for him in order to showcase the previous season wasn't a fluke for his sake in terms of production.