08/17/2026
This is one of the coolest pieces of basketball history ever, and for a long time, almost nobody could actually prove it happened...
On December 21, 1984, Georgeann Wells of West Virginia became the first woman to dunk in an official college basketball game, doing it against Charleston. The wild part is that there wasn’t any WVU film of the moment, no TV crew there to capture it, and for years the dunk basically lived on through eyewitness accounts, newspaper coverage, and the reputation of the photo.
The box score listed 715 in attendance, but people there later said it felt more like a few hundred. Either way, it was a historic moment in a small setting, and the actual tape seemed gone for good.
Then 25 years later, reporter Reed Albergotti tracked down the family of Charleston coach Bud Francis and found out the tape had survived after all. A VHS labeled “W.V.U. - 84 Elkins” turned up in storage, and one of the most important plays in women’s basketball history was finally seen again.
That’s what makes this even better to me. Georgeann Wells made history in real time, but the proof had to be rediscovered years later like buried treasure.
How many people actually knew this story before today?
