The Hazleton Mountaineers were one of the original six franchises in the

Eastern Professional Basketball League The Continental Basketball Association (CBA) (originally known as the Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League, and later as the Eastern Professional Basketball League and the Eastern Basketball Association) was a men's professional basketball mi ...

. The Mountaineers were the league's first team to have an integrated roster, as two former members of the

New York Rens The New York Renaissance, also known as the Renaissance Big R Five and as the Rens, were the first black-owned, all-black, fully-professional basketball team in history, established in October 1923, by Robert "Bob" Douglas. They were named after t ...

, Bill Brown and Zack Clayton, joined John Isaacs on the Mountaineers' roster. The franchise folded after the 1947-48 season, and a second Mountaineers team moved from

Ashland, Pennsylvania Ashland is a borough in Schuylkill County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania, northwest of Pottsville. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania. A small part of the borough also lies in Columbia County, although all of the population resided i ...

during the 1951-52 season, but folded after losing eight straight games.

Year-by-Year

Hazleton Mountaineers, EPBL

Hazleton Mountaineers (from Ashland Greens)

{, class="wikitable" !Year !League !Record !Reg. Season !Playoffs , - , 1951/52 , EPBL , 6-24 (0-8 as Hazleton)
(forfeited last seven games) , 6th , ''did not qualify''

Notable alumni

Morrie Arnovich Morris Arnovich (November 16, 1910 – July 20, 1959) nicknamed "Snooker", was an American baseball player. Arnovich played in Major League Baseball between 1936 and 1946 and played in the World Series winning team in 1940 as a part of the Cinci ...

, major league All Star outfielder Continental Basketball Association teams