Norm Baker started his basketball career at the age of ten playing for the Nanaimo Mosquitos and by age sixteen he became the youngest player ever on a Canadian senior national championship team. In 1947, he played lacrosse with that year’s Mann Cup winners, the New Westminster Adanacs. Baker was inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1978.

Baker was a member of the Canadian championship-winning Victoria Dominoes basketball teams in 1939, 1942, and 1946. He also won the 1943 Canadian championship as a member of the RCAF team, the Pat Bay Gremlins, scoring a record 38 points against Windsor.

Baker turned pro in 1946 and played for the Chicago Stags, the 1947-48 Vancouver Hornets (scoring 1962 points in 70 games, a 28.0 points per game average), the 1949 New York Celtics (touring opponent of the Harlem
Globetrotters), and the 1950-51 and 1952-53 Boston Whirlwinds. In 1948, he joined Portland for post-season play in the pro world championships.

Baker was the only non-American on a team billed as “The Stars of the World” that went on a thirteen nation tour of Europe and Africa in 1950. Baker was voted Canada’s “Outstanding Basketball Player of the Century” in 1950.