backboard

Etymology 1

back + board

noun

  1. (basketball) The flat vertical surface to which the basket is attached.
  2. (tennis) A flat vertical wall with the image of a tennis net drawn or painted on it, designed to practice hitting against such that the ball rebounds.
  3. (medicine) A spine board.
  4. A board placed at the back of a cart, boat, etc.

verb

  1. (medicine, transitive) To place (a patient) on a spine board.

Etymology 2

Likely a borrowing from Dutch bakboord (“portside”) or from Middle Low German backbort, bakbōrt (“portside”). Old English bæcbord (“larboard, portside”) did not survive (in that form) into Middle English; Scottish texts of the 1500s have forms like bawbord, baburd and babord, possibly borrowed from French bâbord; later texts with Scots backburd, backber may have borrowed it from Old Norse bakborði (“portside”). Cognate with West Frisian bakboard (“portside”), German Backbord (“portside”), Danish bagbord (“portside”).

noun

  1. (nautical) The port or larboard side of a ship
    And to delight in the fact that a hole on the backboard side means that you're safe because you're sitting on the starboard side seems to me to be less than clever. 2013, Klaus Backhaus, Hurdle Race Marketing
    But the gangplank was no longer in place. It had folded itself in half and clamped into storage position, becoming part of the starboard rail. Big Tom peered over the rail and saw nothing but sea. All around. Starboard, backboard, forward, aft. 2014, Jeff Bredenberg, The Dream Vessel

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