You know the real reason why New York City is considered the "mecca of basketball"? Because the people who historically have called it that have been members of the sports media. And for a significant period of time in this country (especially when basketball started to grow in national popularity), the major media outlets were based in New York City. So that's the area that got most of the coverage and hype. It was simply that the major media was there to document, spotlight, and broadcast what was going on. So it appeared, for a while at least, that New York was the center of the basketball universe - and perhaps for a time it was..
But look at the real history of the game. The first truly organized game was played in upstate New York in Albany. And from there the game quickly spread... to the Midwest. The first organized leagues were formed in Pittsburgh, Chicago, Kansas, Kentucky, and Minnesota. Only later did leagues form in and around some of the Ivy League campuses back East.
It wasn't until the National Invitation Tournament started in the late '30s that New York City became a legitimate part of basketball's history. And it was the success of that tournament right in the heart of the media's backyard that would be the springboard for what basketball has become today - a truly global game.
Now we live in the information age where location doesn't matter... where players from literally everywhere are well-documented, spotlighted, and glorified. The great sports writers and reporters are no longer clustered in and around the New York City metro area, so the "New York bias" has been significantly diluted. The NIT is no longer the end-all be-all of basketball tournaments; it's an afterthought really.
New York City, once the center stage of basketball greatness, has become nothing more than one of many locations where people love and play the game of basketball.
The Mecca of Basketball? To me it will always be Springfield, Massachusetts since (like Mecca and Muhammad) that's where the game was born.
