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50 free Kareem Abdul-Jabbar trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Kareem Abdul-Jabbar trivia quiz covers the 7-foot-2 center who was the NBA's all-time leading scorer for nearly forty years. The easy questions cover the shot nobody could block, the two franchises he played for, the record six MVP awards and the co-pilot role in Airplane! that introduced him to people who never watched basketball. From there the quiz moves through the career in order: the 71-game winning streak at Power Memorial, three straight national titles at UCLA and the dunk ban that followed, the coin toss that sent him to Milwaukee, the 1971 title with Oscar Robertson, the trade to Los Angeles and the Showtime years beside Magic Johnson. The hard end covers the details: the Sports Illustrated announcement of his new name, the 1968 Olympic boycott, the Game of the Century in the Astrodome, the goggles, the night in Utah he passed Wilt Chamberlain, the oldest Finals MVP ever, the Oklahoma Storm, the White Mountain Apache season, the Bruce Lee film, the Mycroft Holmes novels and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Every answer was checked against Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's encyclopaedia entry before publishing and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our Los Angeles Lakers, NBA and Magic Johnson quizzes are natural next stops.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Under what name did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar play high school and college basketball?
Lew Alcindor
He was born Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr. in New York City in 1947.
Q 02What was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's trademark shot?
The skyhook
He could shoot it from up to 16 feet and was stronger with his right hand than his left.
Q 03How many NBA Most Valuable Player awards did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar win, a record?
Six
The first came with Milwaukee in 1971 and the last in his first season of the Showtime era in 1979-80.
Q 04Which franchise drafted Kareem Abdul-Jabbar first overall in 1969?
Milwaukee Bucks
The one-season-old team had won a coin toss with Phoenix for the pick.
Q 05For how many seasons did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar play in the NBA?
20
He retired in 1989 at age 42 as the league's career leader in points, games and minutes.
Q 06In the 1980 comedy Airplane!, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar played a co-pilot with what name?
Roger Murdock
A boy visiting the cockpit insists he is really the basketball star, and the character eventually snaps.
Q 07How many consecutive wins did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's Power Memorial high school team run up?
71
Under coach Jack Donohue the team went 79-2 overall with a run of New York City Catholic titles.
Q 08How many consecutive NCAA national championships did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar win at UCLA?
Three
Freshmen were ineligible for varsity, so his 21-0 first-year team never counted toward a title.
Q 09What did college basketball ban after Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's sophomore season, in a rule named for him?
The dunk
The so-called Alcindor Rule only pushed him to perfect his hook shot instead.
Q 10Which Baseball Hall of Famer and UCLA alumnus wrote urging teenage Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to attend UCLA?
Jackie Robinson
Assistant coach Jerry Norman did the actual recruiting.
Q 11Which Houston forward scored 39 as UCLA's 47-game streak ended in the 1968 'Game of the Century'?
Elvin Hayes
Kareem, playing with a scratched cornea, was held to 15 points; UCLA won the NCAA rematch 101-69.
Q 12Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's first public UCLA game in 1965 was the inaugural game at which arena?
Pauley Pavilion
His freshman team beat the defending national champion varsity, prompting UPI to call the varsity the second-best team on campus.
Q 13Which international event did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar boycott in 1968?
The Summer Olympics
He decided not to try out for the U.S. team at all.
Q 21Which of these players went to Milwaukee in the trade that sent Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Los Angeles?
Junior Bridgeman
The package was Elmore Smith, Brian Winters, Dave Meyers, Junior Bridgeman and cash, with Walt Wesley joining Kareem in LA.
Q 22How many times was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar selected as an NBA All-Star?
19
The only year he missed in 20 seasons was 1978; the record stood until 2024.
Q 23Against which team did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar break Wilt Chamberlain's scoring record in April 1984?
Utah Jazz
He scored the record basket on a skyhook over 7-foot-4 shot-blocker Mark Eaton.
Q 14How much did the Globetrotters offer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to sign with them out of college?
$1 million
He declined and went first overall in both the NBA and ABA drafts.
Q 15Which ABA team also chose Kareem Abdul-Jabbar first overall in 1969?
New York Nets
He turned them down too, saying he would not degrade the league representatives by playing them off against each other.
Q 16How did Milwaukee win the right to draft Kareem Abdul-Jabbar first?
A coin toss with the Phoenix Suns
Milwaukee had gone 27-55 the year before and jumped to 56-26 in his rookie season.
Q 17Which All-Star guard did Milwaukee acquire before the 1970-71 season, helping Kareem win his first title?
Oscar Robertson
That season Kareem also won his first scoring title, his first MVP and the Finals MVP.
Q 18To which branch of Islam did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar convert from Catholicism in the summer of 1968?
Sunni
He was named by Hamaas Abdul Khaalis of the Hanafi Movement, though the two later parted ways.
Q 19What is the rough translation of the name Kareem Abdul-Jabbar?
Noble one, servant of the Almighty
He asked publicly to be called by it at a State Department press conference on June 3, 1971.
Q 20In what year was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar traded from Milwaukee to the Lakers?
1975
Sportscaster Marv Albert had reported his trade request that March; he preferred the Knicks.
Q 24How many career regular-season points did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar finish with?
38,387
He also retired holding the records for games, minutes, field goals made and blocked shots.
Q 25Who broke Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's career scoring record on February 7, 2023?
LeBron James
He did it as a Laker, in Los Angeles, with Kareem in the building.
Q 26Why did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar start wearing his trademark goggles in 1974?
He was poked in the eye during preseason
He resumed wearing them for good in 1980 after Rudy Tomjanovich accidentally caught his right eye.
Q 27Which player did the Lakers pick first overall in 1979, launching the Showtime era alongside Kareem?
Magic Johnson
Kareem won his sixth and final MVP in that rookie's first season.
Q 28Kareem sprained his ankle in Game 5 of the 1980 Finals yet returned to finish with how many points?
40
He missed the clinching Game 6, in which a rookie guard jumped centre and won Finals MVP.
Q 29Which 76ers centre outrebounded Kareem 72-30 in the 1983 Finals sweep and took Finals MVP?
Moses Malone
He grabbed 27 offensive rebounds, nearly matching Kareem's total of 30.
Q 30How old was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar when he became the oldest Finals MVP ever in 1985?
38
He had been outplayed by Robert Parish in the Game 1 blowout, then took over the series.