A remarkable telethon:

Elmer Snow, then general manager of WTTV (Channel 4), which aired the Pacers games, offered to hold a telethon to keep the team in Indiana. The telethon began on the night of July 3, 1977 in the 500 Ballroom of the Indiana Convention Center. Ten minutes before going off the air, Nancy Leonard, wife of the Pacers' coach, announced that season ticket sales had topped 8,000. The telethon helped assure the Pacers a second season in the NBA. Although they survived that financial crisis, the Pacers continued to struggle. In 1977-78 they finished 31-51, in 1978-79, 38-44, and in 1979-80, 37-45.

FROM the STAR:

Telethon kept team, saved city's image

Pacers, city officials sprung into action 25 years ago as debts mounted

By Sekou Smith

Published: July 2, 2002

The Indianapolis Star

Chet Coppock laughed at the idea of the "Save the Pacers" Telethon 25 years ago.

Twenty-five years later, he's still laughing.

"To this day, I don't know how many tickets we sold and I don't think anybody knows," said Coppock, then the sports director of WISH-8 and now a talk-show host at Sporting News Radio.

Coppock helped emcee the exhausting 16 1/2-hour telethon in 1977 that's credited with saving the Pacers from being sold and moved. The 25th anniversary of that franchise-saving event is Wednesday.

"The whole thing made no sense to me," said Coppock, speaking Monday by telephone. "But being the shameless, self-promoter that I am, I knew it was a golden opportunity to put myself in the forefront as one of the emcees. I can remember firefighters and policemen coming in to help out. It was a very serious thing to so many people.

"I just remember thinking that if we could save them (the Pacers), it would keep me from having to cover Warren Central or Ben Davis seven days a week. Deep down, though, I always thought the whole thing was a hustle."

A hustle was in order for an organization still making the transition from ABA championship team to NBA newcomer, because the change in leagues came with a steep price tag. The Pacers' first season in the NBA was 1976-77.

There had been the initial $3.2 million fee to join the NBA. There was also the compensation package the Pacers, as well as three other ABA teams that were joining the NBA, had to pay for the ABA teams that didn't survive the merger. Also, the Pacers wouldn't get to share in NBA television revenues until 1980.

In short, the Pacers needed money quickly in 1977 or the franchise would be lost to another city. The situation reached a breaking point in early July.

The announcement was made that if season-ticket sales for the 1977-78 season didn't reach 8,000 by the end of July, the franchise would be sold by its ownership group, known as Arena Sports Inc., to someone who might move it. The idea for the telethon came next.

"I remember being up all night back then," said Doug McKee, a controller with the Pacers who's been with the organization the past 26 years. "I really think that the city felt it was their team. The players lived in town back then and everything. That whole time was really something."

The telethon began on the evening of July 3. The next day, 10 minutes before the show was set to go off the air, it was announced that team officials had reached the 8,000-ticket goal.

Bob "Slick" Leonard, then coach and general manager of the Pacers, stood before the cameras. His wife and assistant general manager Nancy Leonard made the teary-eyed announcement that the goal had been met.

"Two things stand out to me about the experience," Slick Leonard recalled. "The biggest thing was the kids. They were coming in with their piggy banks and tin cans full of money, so you know we reached people. The other thing is, when it ended, we sang 'Back Home Again (in Indiana).' "

Nancy Leonard said the toughest part of the ordeal was realizing just how close Indianapolis was to losing pro basketball.

"I knew if we didn't meet our goal, we probably wouldn't ever get another team back," she said. "But when we got down to the final 24 hours (for the ticket sale deadline) and the kids started coming in, that's when you knew you were doing the right thing."

And the results were tangible. The Pacers' average attendance jumped from 7,615 during the 1976-77 season, their first in the NBA, to 10,982 during the 1977-78 season.

The telethon not only rescued the Pacers, it saved the city and, perhaps more importantly, the self-image of its residents.

"I don't know how many greenbacks it raised," Coppock said, "but we awakened the spirit of a city that, had it lost NBA basketball, would have become Des Moines, Iowa. Back then, Indianapolis was a town that was still fighting a terrible inferiority complex. From an image standpoint, had the city lost the Pacers, I don't think (Robert) Irsay and the Colts would have ever made the move they did (from Baltimore)."

Even after the telethon in 1977, the franchise would need to be saved again. This time, it was the spring of 1983. The Pacers were coming off their worst finish (20-62) in seven NBA seasons. The primary owner at the time, West Coast businessman Sam Nassi, shopped the team to interested parties in California.

That's when the current owners, Mel and Herb Simon, came to the rescue. They purchased the Pacers and kept the team and NBA basketball in Indianapolis.

That second rescue, though, wouldn't have been possible without the first -- the telethon.

"In hindsight, I realize it (1977) was the essence of the disco era," Coppock said. "It was John Travolta comes to basketball. It was about the quick fix and immediate gratification.

"But so help me . . . it would have done irreparable damage to the self-image of the city if the Pacers couldn't have been saved in 1977."