The San Diego Wildcards were a men's professional basketball team representing

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United State ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

who competed in the Continental Basketball Association (CBA) during the 1995–96 season. The team was owned by

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most populous urban a ...

based sports executive

Doug Logan Douglas George Logan y Gonzales de Mendoza (born 1943) is an American sports executive. He was the inaugural commissioner of Major League Soccer, and later served as the CEO of USA Track & Field. Early life Logan was born in New Jersey to an A ...

and coached by Mauro Panaggio, who has the most wins as a coach in CBA history. The

San Diego Sports Arena Pechanga Arena (historically known as the San Diego Sports Arena) is an indoor arena built in 1966 and located in the Midway area of San Diego, California. The arena seats 12,000 for indoor football, 12,920 for ice hockey, indoor soccer and ...

served as the Wildcards' home venue. The team folded on January 5, 1996 after placing a 4–17 record.

History

The team was brought to San Diego in 1995 after their predecessor, the

Mexico City Aztecas The Mexico Aztecas (or ''Mexico City Aztecs'', ''Aztecas de México'') team was a professional basketball team in the Continental Basketball Association (CBA). Created as an experiment in fielding a team outside the United States and Canada, it p ...

, folded. Southern California would prove to be the last stop for the franchise, which went through various incarnations in different cities since 1982:

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

;

Savannah, Georgia Savannah ( ) is the oldest city in the U.S. state of Georgia and is the county seat of Chatham County. Established in 1733 on the Savannah River, the city of Savannah became the British colonial capital of the Province of Georgia and later t ...

;

Tulsa Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...

; Fargo, North Dakota and

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...

. In September 1995 it was announced that the team's nickname would be the "Wildcards". The name came from the franchise's principal sponsor

Viejas Casino Viejas Casino and Resort is a hotel casino and outlet center owned by the Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians, located in Alpine, California. The casino has over 2,000 slot machines, up to 86 table games, three restaurants, a deli, bingo, an off-trac ...

. who had their name on the team's jersey. At a press conference announcing the sponsorship, team owner

wore multi-colored glasses with bells attached, resembling a joker, the team's mascot. In an effort to boost ticket sales, a Wildcards radio advertisement claimed CBA games would be more entertaining than

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

Los Angeles Clippers The Los Angeles Clippers are an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles. The Clippers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Pacific Division in the league's Western Conference. The Clipper ...

games. During broadcasts of the Los Angeles Lakers games on

KSWB-TV KSWB-TV (channel 69) is a television station in San Diego, California, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. Owned by Nexstar Media Group, the station maintains studios on Engineer Road in the city's Kearny Mesa section, and its tran ...

the Wildcards hosted "one-minute ticket telethons" hosted by broadcaster Chris Ello. Mauro Panaggio was hired as the team's

head coach A head coach, senior coach or manager is a professional at training and developing athletes. They typically hold a more public profile and are paid more than other coaches. In some sports, the head coach is instead called the "manager", as in assoc ...

. Panaggio, who had coached in the CBA for 14 seasons and had more wins than any coach in league history, warned the media that the team may have trouble catching on, stating, "No one should get too comfortable here. If they aren't producing, they will have a short stay in San Diego." Panaggio was originally hired for a

front office The front office is the part of a company that comes in contact with clients, such as the marketing, sales, and service departments. The term has more specific meaning in different industries. Types General offices The function of front office ...

position, but he stepped into the head coaching role after being told by Logan that he could not find anyone to fill the vacancy. Jarvis Basnigh was selected by San Diego during the 1995 CBA dispersal draft. The Wildcards chose three players during the 1995 CBA draft: Dwight Stewart out of

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...

, Mike Williams from UMass, and Brian Fair from

UConn The University of Connecticut (UConn) is a public land-grant research university in Storrs, Connecticut, a village in the town of Mansfield. The primary 4,400-acre (17.8 km2) campus is in Storrs, approximately a half hour's drive from ...

1995-96 season

The Wildcards first game was at the

on November 17, 1995 against the

Chicago Rockers The Chicago Rockers were a men's professional basketball team based in Chicago from 1994 to 1996. The Rockers competed in the American Conference of the Continental Basketball Association (CBA). The team was owned by Chris Devine, a Chicago busi ...

; the Wildcards won, 108-106, on guard Kareem Townes' game-winning bucket with six seconds left. Mark Zeigler of the '' San Diego Union-Tribune'' wrote, "They had a professional basketball game last night at the Sports Arena and — here's the weird part — people were actually standing and cheering. For the home team." But attendance that first night was only 3,310, in the 14,800-seat

. Veteran NBA and CBA guard Greg Grant, who had been with the franchise in Mexico, played only one game with the Wildcards (with three points and nine assists) before being signed by the Philadelphia 76ers on November 21, 1995. After the opening night win, though, the 'Cards were decked on a regular basis, losing ten of their next eleven games. Attendance remained low, causing concern that the team would have to move (again) or fold outright. San Diego's general manager Jeff Quinn told ''The San Diego Union-Tribune'', "We're substantially less n attendancethan I would have thought we would be right now. I would have thought we'd have been drawing somewhere around 3,000. I'm a little mystified. I don't know the answer right now." Panaggio's "short stay in San Diego" comment proved to be prophetic: on January 5, 1996, the Wildcards officially ceased operations. Team owner Doug Logan claimed the team lost $35,000 per week. The team's final record was 4–17.

Roster

References

{{reflist, 2 Basketball teams in San Diego Basketball teams in California Continental Basketball Association teams