Basketball was on the Olympic programme in 1904, but the event was contested by only a few American club teams and actually served as the AAU (Amateur （业余爱好者）Athletic Union of the USA) Championship for that year. Thus the event is usually considered only an exhibition. The winning team, incidentally（偶然地）, was the Buffalo German club, which was so dominant in those days that they were inducted（引导；引入） into the Basketball Hall of Fame as a team.
In 1936, basketball made its first appearance as a medal sport at the Olympics, and the sport has been included in every Olympic Games since. In 1976, women's basketball was added to the programme. The United States has dominated international basketball. The USA won all the Olympic titles until 1972 when they were defeated by the Soviet Union. The Soviet women were originally the top team on the female side, winning gold in 1976, 1980 and 1992, but the US women have now surpassed them, winning gold medals in 1984, 1988, 1996 and 2000.
Today, basketball has become one of the most popular sports in the world, rivalling （竞争，对抗）football (soccer) for world-wide popularity and trailing only volleyball and track and field athletics in terms of number of member federations. US College basketball is wildly popular in the United States, culminating each March with the NCAA Championships. The National Basketball Association (NBA) is the professional basketball league in the United States and universally considered to be the strongest in the world with the European leagues being close in terms of competition and public awareness.
温馨提示：答案为网友推荐，仅供参考