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HISTORY The history of the Carolina Cougars franchise began when the former Houston ABA franchise was relocated to North Carolina in 1969. During the 1970s , North Carolina did not have a large primary metropolitan area to base a professional sports franchise, so the team's ownership decided to have the teams play its home games in Charlotte at the Cricket Arena , Greensboro at the Greensboro Coliseum , and Raleigh at the Dorton Arena and Reynolds Coliseum as a regional team. Early on, the Carolina Cougars were not especially successful on the court, posting a 42-42 record in the 1969- 1970 season, a 34-50 record in 1970- 1971 , and a 35-49 record in 1971- 1972 . Only the '69-'70 Cougars managed to make the ABA playoffs but lost in the Eastern Division Semifinals (first round) to a much stronger Indiana Pacers team. In spite of this, the Cougars had a good fan following, particularly in Greensboro. In 1972- 1973 , the Carolina Cougars hired retired ABA players Larry Brown and former Cougar Doug Moe as coaches. The '72-'73 Cougars were fairly talented and featured players Steve "Snapper" Jones, Gene Littles, and Ed Manning (father of Danny Manning ). Carolina went on to post a 57-27 record, which was the best in the Eastern Division and the entire ABA as well. The Cougars beat the New York Nets in their first-round playoff series 4-1, but lost a close series to the Kentucky Colonels 4-3 in the Eastern Division finals. The 1973- 1974 season proved to be the last for the Carolina Cougars in North Carolina. Due to injuries and internal squabbles, the '73-'74 Cougars posted a 47-37 record but was swept in the Eastern Division semifinals 4-0 by the Kentucky Colonels. Later in 1974, the Carolina Cougars were moved to Missouri and became the Spirits Of St. Louis until the ABA folded in 1976 . The Cougars were moderately successful overall and had more supportive fans than many other ABA franchises; nonetheless, even those elements were not enough to keep the Cougars from relocating. Professional basketball would return to North Carolina in 1988 when the Charlotte Hornets entered the NBA , but the Hornets would eventually move to New Orleans in 2002 . The NBA returned to Charlotte two years later when Charlotte Bobcats began their inaugural NBA season in 2004 - 2005 . EXTERNAL LINK
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