NEW YORK: The National Basketball Association (NBA) Tuesday announced details of the 2nd annual Junior NBA Global Championship, a youth basketball tournament for the top 13 and 14-year-old boys and girls teams from around the world that will be held 6-11 August at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Florida.
32 teams will participate in a week of on-court competition and off-court programming centred on the Junior NBA’s core values of teamwork, respect, determination and community.
The international competition, which will once again leverage the Junior NBA’s extensive global reach, will expand to additional countries and territories. India is all set to be a part of the Asia Pacific regional tournament featuring the likes of China, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam which will begin with round-robin play and continue with single-elimination competition.
The winning boys and girls teams will receive all-expenses-paid trips to compete in the culminating event in Orlando on 11 August 2019.
NBA has confirmed its media partners in USA and China as of now. It remains to be seen if the league announces the same for India.
It will introduce a new layer of local competitions as well, including more than 20 local tournaments – 14 of which will be hosted by NBA teams in their respective markets – to expand the pool of participating boys and girls teams in the United States.
Long-time league partner and leading basketball stakeholder USA Basketball will enhance all domestic competitions and help increase accessibility by accrediting local tournaments, again licensing participating coaches, supporting all eight United States regional tournaments and promoting best practices through the implementation of the NBA and USA Basketball Youth Guidelines.
Qualifying competitions will tip off in January 2019 and run through June 2019. In the United States the winning boys and girls teams from each of the new local tournaments will advance to one of eight regional tournaments in the spring.
