Claim: The Los Angeles Lakers defeated the Knicks in the Finals championship.

The 1971 -- 72 NBA season was the 26th season of the National Basketball Association . The season ended with the Los Angeles Lakers winning the NBA Championship , beating the New York Knicks 4 games to 1 in the NBA Finals .   As the 25th anniversary of the founding of the modern NBA , the league unveiled a new logo , inspired by the logo of Major League Baseball , to commemorate the occasion . It features the white silhouette of a basketball player dribbling , framed by red and blue . Jerry West of the Los Angeles Lakers was used as the model for the logo . Coincidentally , Jerry West would win the only NBA Championship of his career during the season .