Be it the 76ers or Lakers, Wilt Chamberlain usually had his way with the Sonics. In this game from November 1970, the Dipper towers over Seattle's Dan Kojis (22), Pete Cross (41)and Dick Snyder while teammate Jim McMillan watches with awe.

Wilt Chamberlain had a tendency to defy the natural landscape.

Forty-one years ago today, the towering colossus capped an extraordinary Yuletide season against the expansion Seattle SuperSonics with what for him was just one more eye-popping game.

Chamberlain, the Philadelphia native who was dubbed "Wilt the Stilt" but preferred to be called the "Big Dipper," poured in 53 points and grabbed 38 rebounds as the 76ers coasted to a 160-122 victory before a crowd of 7,714 at Seattle Coliseum.

The Sonics saw enough of Chamberlain and the defending NBA champion 76ers that month to last them an eternity. The teams played four games that December in three cities, and none of them was Philadelphia. Philly won all four by double-digit margins.

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It was Dec. 20, 1967, and the News Tribune was stuffed with Christmas advertisements.
Piggly Wiggly had turkeys on sale for 29 cents a pound. Schoenfelds, which opened its downtown Tacoma store in 1902, offered a Frigidaire top loading dishwasher for $143.88.

On the News Tribune's front page, a hopeful story quoted President Lyndon Johnson saying the Vietnam war "could be stopped in a matter of days."

Another story, which noted that 4,300 American "jungle fighters" from the U.S. 11th Infantry Brigade had just landed at Qui Nhon, offered a hint that the end was nowhere in sight.

At the Coliseum, the Big Dipper lowered the boom on the SuperSonics.

Chamberlain, who stood 7-foot-1, weighed 275 pounds and ran the 100-yard dash in 10.9 seconds as a Kansas freshman, made 20 of 23 field-goal attempts before leaving the game for good with 2:46 remaining. He converted just 13 of 26 from the foul line.

The 53 points were more than any opponent scored against Seattle until 1990, when ex-Sonic Tom Chambers put up 60 for Phoenix. The 38 rebounds stands as the single-game record for a Sonics' opponent.

Chamberlain's 53-point, 38-rebound tour de force barely eclipsed his own briefly held records.

Just 19 days earlier, on Dec. 1, the Dipper accumulated 52 points and 37 rebounds against the Sonics in a 133-109 Philadelphia win in a game played in the Boston Garden.

And on Dec. 17 in Seattle, he racked up 47 points and 26 rebounds, making 19 of 24 shot attempts in a 139-124 Philly win.

News Tribune writer Ranny Green could only say that "all the superlatives fashioned in Wilt Chamberlain's behalf over the years are merited."

In three games over the span of 19 days, Chamberlain had totaled 152 points and 101 rebounds against Seattle. The man who once averaged 50.4 points for an entire NBA season had savaged the fledgling Sonics for an average of 51 points and 34 rebounds over a three-game annihilation.

Chamberlain, who averaged 22.9 rebounds over his entire NBA career, didn't play in the teams' other matchup that December, a 118-107 Philly win at Madison Square Garden in New York on Dec. 12.