Toronto Raptors

History

As the Toronto Raptors approached their scheduled home opener at the SkyDome on November 3, 1995, club President John I. Bitove could congratulate himself on having pulled off a remarkable achievement.

Bringing NBA basketball back to Toronto, where the long-forgotten Toronto Huskies had tipped off against the New York Knickerbockers in 1946, had been an arduous process, fraught with obstacle after obstacle. It had not been such a struggle a half-century ago, when the Huskies became a charter member of the Basketball Association of America, the forerunner of the NBA. In fact, Toronto had hosted the new league's first game on November 1, 1946, when the Knicks beat the Huskies, 68-66. The Toronto franchise folded at the end of the 1946-47 season, however, and the NBA wouldn't return to Canada for nearly 50 years.

In the 1995 NBA Draft held at SkyDome in Toronto, the Raptors' first-ever draft pick (seventh overall) was 5-10 point guard Damon Stoudamire from Arizona. The pick surprised most of the 20,000 in attendance, who were expecting the Raptors to take Ed O'Bannon from UCLA. "They'll know who Damon Stoudamire is by the time I'm through playing," the young recruit said confidently. In the second round Toronto picked University of Michigan guard Jimmy King, the fourth member of the vaunted "Fab Five" to be drafted into the NBA.

2006-07 Roster

7 Andrea Bargnani F

4 Chris Bosh F

8 Jose Calderon G

11 TJ Ford G

15 Jorge Garbajosa F

14 Joey Graham F

43 Kris Humphries F

20 Fred Jones G

2 Darrick Martin G

12 Rasho Nesterovic C

18 Anthony Parker G-F