Here’s a couple of trivia questions: What team was the first to use the gymnasium now known as Folsom Gym at Lawrence High School in Fairfield? Where did Jerry West play his first professional basketball game?

When Jerry West retired the other day, it sent me scurrying into my archives for an old tape recording.

The Lakers were on their way to Bangor to play the Celtics in a preseason game, stopping in Fairfield to practice in the brand new Lawrence High School gym.

That was the same year the Lakers moved from Minneapolis to Los Angeles, 1960-61, the same year the Twin Cities got the Twins in the spring of ’61 and Vikings in the fall of that year. The Lakers felt they couldn’t compete for the limited entertainment dollar in the market.

West would be part of that first Los Angeles team, along with coach Fred Schaus, West’s college coach at West Virginia; Elgin Baylor; and another West Virginia product, Rodney “Hot Rod” Hundley.

The L.A. Lakers wouldn’t win a championship for 12 years. In 1960-61, the Celtics won their fourth straight, on their way to eight in a row (take note, Bulls fans). Schaus would be the 1971-72 Lakers general manager, but the team would be coached by former Celtics Bill Sharman and K.C. Jones.

Listening to the tape, Schaus says the Celts are the team to beat, “the finest basketball team in the world,” and have helped themselves by acquiring Tom “Satch” Sanders of NYU, the team that knocked West Virginia out of the Eastern Regional finals last season.

Baylor says the players are happy about the team’s move to L.A. financially, but also points out the time difference, flying from the West Coast, will be difficult.

West and I are about the same age and he is calling me “sir.” He’s about to play his first professional game and is excited to play the world champs.

Superstitious folks say West, Baylor and their teammates left winning echos in that gym, invisible steps to follow. Three coaches have compiled outstanding records here, none of whom knew about the Lakers’ visit.

Between 1961 and 1976, Charles “Gus” Folsom, for whom the gym is named, took the Bulldog boys to the tournament 10 of the 15 years, going to the Eastern Maine championship five times and winning two. He compiled an overall 198-101 mark with the boys. Add the five years he coached the girls (1984-85 to 1988-89) and he is 248-156.

The 1960-61 season was the year before Folsom arrived in Fairfield. Asked if he believed having the Lakers play in the gym was a good omen, Folsom said, “I might have believed it if it had been the Celtics. I may have felt differently if I had been a coach there at the time. Having a team of that caliber playing in the gym would have been a good sign and I would hope the players would [think so], too.”

Is he superstitious? “Having George Wentworth as a coach [at Stearns High School], you didn’t believe in that nonsense. Although when we won our first championship in 1950, we drove by the same neighborhood grocery store every night. He stopped there the first night and bought oranges. We won, so we stopped before every game. But I don’t remember having superstitions, either as a player or coach.”

Mike McGee, who was on both of Folsom’s Eastern Maine championship teams, has coached the boys since the 1985-86 season, has missed the tourney just once, been to five state championship games, winning two. He is 260-129 overall.

When asked if he would have done anything differently had known about the Laker visit, McGee replied, “I probably would have been upset because the Celtics didn’t use it. I was a Lakers’ hater. I never missed a game when [Larry] Bird was there. [Kevin] McHale, [Robert] Parrish. I couldn’t stand Kareem [Abdul-Jabbar].”

Last season, the Lakers, coached by Phil Jackson, played the Indiana Pacers, coached by Larry Bird, for the NBA championship. McGee admires Jackson and has read all his books. But he was cheering for Bird and the Pacers.

Bruce Cooper coached the Bulldog girls for 10 years (167-38) and arguably through the four greatest seasons of any basketball team in the state – the “Cindy” years. Clinton’s Cindy Blodgett, now with Sacramento of the WNBA, led Lawrence to four straight state championships, from 1990-94, compiling a 68-4 record along the way. Would Cooper have done anything differently had he known about the Laker visit?

“I don’t know if I would have done anything differently, like putting West’s picture up on a locker and touching it on the way to a game. Back along, I was a Lakers fan. I liked the Celtics, too, because you could hear them all the time on the radio. But I really loved that team with West, Happy Hairston and [Wilt] Chamberlain. [The first Laker championship team.]”

Cooper does have superstitions. He says it’s not like wearing the same underwear to every game but during his four-year state championship run, the team would always go to the Bangor Mall before each game and throw coins into the wishing well.

“I don’t know what it is [about superstition],” he mused. “Maybe people think luck is involved in superstition.”

And just perhaps West, Baylor, and Company did leave a legacy in the gym that crisp fall day in 1960.