The Miami Tropics were a team in the Premier Basketball League that began to play in 2007 in Miami, Florida. The team was owned by the Imperiali Organization, which also owns the Palm Beach Imperials. They originally played their inaugural season in the American Basketball Association, but moved to the PBL with its creation in early 2007. They also represented the United States in the FIBA Americas League.
The original Miami Tropics played in the United States Basketball League. In 1987, the Tropics won the USBL title, defeating the Rhode Island Gulls in the championship game. The team boasted the USBL player of the year World B. Free, Mario Elie and Anthony Grant, current head coach at the University of Alabama.
The Tropics were eventually sold to John Lucas who parlayed his coaching experience, and two more USBL titles, into an National Basketball Association coaching career.
Famous quotes containing the word tropics:
“He is the best sailor who can steer within the fewest points of the wind, and extract a motive power out of the greatest obstacles. Most begin to veer and tack as soon as the wind changes from aft, and as within the tropics it does not blow from all points of the compass, there are some harbors which they can never reach.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)