The British Basketball League Championship, often shortened to the BBL Championship, is the top-level men's professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

league in the United Kingdom. Established in 1987, the competition is administered by the

British Basketball League The British Basketball League (BBL) is a men's professional basketball league in Great Britain and represents the highest level of play in the countries. The league is contested by 10 teams from England and Scotland. There are no clubs howeve ...

and comprises 10 teams from both England and Scotland. Each team plays a 27-game regular season, from September until April, with the team that finishes in first place being crowned as League champions. Following the end of the regular season, the top eight-placed teams advance to the post-season Play-off tournament to decide the winner of the BBL Championship. There is currently no promotion or relegation between the second-tier

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

and Scottish leagues and the BBL Championship because of the franchise system in use in the BBL, although several clubs have been elected from the English Basketball League in recent years.

History

Since 1972, the

English Basketball Association Basketball England (BE, formally ''England Basketball'')National Basketball League provided competition for the country's top basketball clubs. The league started with six clubs, but grew each year to include multiple divisions featuring teams from across England. However, by the mid-1980s, following an increase in the sport's popularity due to coverage from television network

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

, the League's foremost clubs – looking to improve the basketball's image through greater professionalism – broke away from the English Basketball Association and formed their own administration. The new organisation, simply called the Basketball League, was established in 1987 and saw a franchise-based set-up where every member would have an equal shareholding and a representative on the League's Board of Directors, and with no promotion or relegation to the lower leagues aiming at increasing the league's stability. The NBL's sponsorship deal from the

Carlsberg Group Carlsberg A/S (; ) is a Danish multinational brewer. Founded in 1847 by J. C. Jacobsen, the company's headquarters is in Copenhagen, Denmark. Since Jacobsen's death in 1887, the majority owner of the company has been the Carlsberg Foundation. T ...

continued with the new organisation and the newly founded Carlsberg League tipped off its inaugural season in 1987. A total of 15 teams took to the floor for the 1987–88 season, with the new League including all 13 former NBL teams present as well as drafting in new entrants

Oldham Celtics Oldham is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, amid the Pennines and between the rivers Irk and Medlock, southeast of Rochdale and northeast of Manchester. It is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, whic ...

(promoted from NBL Division 2) and

Livingston Livingston may refer to: Businesses * Livingston Energy Flight, an Italian airline (2003–2010) * Livingston Compagnia Aerea, an Italian airline (2011–2014), also known as Livingston Airline * Livingston International, a North American custom ...

(elected from the Scottish National League). The new league continued the NBL's policy of allowing only two import players to be registered per team.

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port and city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. The city of Portsmouth has been a unitary authority since 1 April 1997 and is administered by Portsmouth City Council. Portsmouth is the most dens ...

were the early pace-setters and pipped Kingston to the first regular-season League title but it was underdogs Livingston, the only member based outside England, that claimed the first Championship thanks to an 81–72 victory over Portsmouth in the Play-off Final. Portsmouth's dominance was short-lived however and after a failed attempt to relocate to

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of Letter (alphabet), letters, symbols, etc., especially by Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process invo ...

, the franchise withdrew from the League in 1988. This was the beginning of a membership crisis for the Carlsberg League, with no fewer than seven teams withdrawing from the competition by the start of the 1989–90 season. With a lack of teams, the League opened up for expansion and brought in the newly rebranded

London Docklands London Docklands is the riverfront and former docks in London. It is located in inner east and southeast London, in the boroughs of London Borough of Southwark, Southwark, London Borough of Tower Hamlets, Tower Hamlets, London Borough of ...

team along with

Cheshire Jets The Cheshire Phoenix are a professional basketball team based in Ellesmere Port, England. Founded in 1984, they are members of the British Basketball League and play their home games at the Cheshire Oaks Arena. From 1993 until 2015 the team was ...

and

Worthing Bears Brighton Bears was a British basketball team based in Brighton, Sussex. From 1984 to 1999 the club was known as the Worthing Bears and was based in the town of Worthing, 12 miles west of Brighton. The Bears played in the top-flight British Bas ...

from the NBL, whilst readmitting

Birmingham Bullets The Birmingham Bullets were a British professional basketball team from Birmingham, England who competed in the British Basketball League (BBL). The club was founded in 1974 as Coventry Granwood before moving to Birmingham in 1980 as part of the ...

and

Hemel Royals London Lions are a British professional basketball team based in Stratford, London, Stratford, East London, England, and compete in the British Basketball League, the top tier of British basketball. The team was originally founded in 1977 as th ...

over the next couple of seasons. In 1990, the league was rebranded as the Carlsberg League Division One, after the Carlsberg Group decided to extend its sponsorship to the lower leagues. Kingston dominated the League throughout its early years and under the guidance of Coach

Kevin Cadle Kevin Cadle (March 17, 1955 – October 16, 2017) was a British-based American sports presenter and former basketball coach. Cadle was born in Buffalo, New York in 1955. After retiring from coaching in 1997, Cadle presented American football and ...

– the most successful coach in British Basketball history – netted four consecutive regular season and Championship titles from 1989 (as

Glasgow Rangers Rangers Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the Govan district of Glasgow which plays in the Scottish Premiership. Although not its official name, it is often referred to as Glasgow Rangers outside Scotland. The fou ...

) to 1992. In 1993, the competition was rebranded again due to new sponsorship deal from

Budweiser Budweiser () is an American-style pale lager, part of AB InBev. Introduced in 1876 by Carl Conrad & Co. of St. Louis, Missouri, Budweiser has become a large selling beer company in the United States. ''Budweiser'' may also refer to an unrelat ...

, thus becoming the Budweiser Basketball League. The addition of

Sheffield Sharks The Sheffield Sharks, currently known as "B.Braun Sheffield Sharks" for sponsorship reasons, are a professional basketball team from the city of Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. The Sharks play in the British Basketball League and play thei ...

(from the NBL) and the London-based

Leopards The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus '' Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia, ...

in 1994 ushered in a new era for the League, with both teams utilising multimillion-pound arenas to stage home games. It was a huge step away from the traditional, small sports centre venues that were commonplace throughout the League (though London Docklands briefly used

London Arena The London Arena (also known as London Docklands Arena) was an indoor arena and exhibition centre in Millwall, close to Cubitt Town area of Poplar, on the Isle of Dogs, in east London, England which was inaugurated in 1989 and demolished for h ...

for home games). With financial backing from the

Chrysalis Group Chrysalis Group was a UK media company that was founded by Chris Wright, chairman, and Terry Ellis. Wright was named in '' Sunday Times Rich List 2009'' of the 1,000 richest persons in the UK. Previously having interests in television, books a ...

, Sheffield stormed to their first League title in 1994–95 season – their rookie season. Following the demise of Kingston, who had since moved to Guildford to become the

Guildford Kings Guildford Kings was a successful British basketball franchise, most prominent in the British Basketball League (BBL) during the early 1990s. They ceased operations at the end of the 1993–94 season. History The franchise's origins date back to t ...

, Worthing made their mark in history with three back-to-back Play-off Finals victories from 1993 to 1995. In 1995, the Budweiser League secured a deal with

BSkyB Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...

to broadcast games live on its

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British subscription sports channels operated by the satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television sports brand in the United Kingdom and Ireland. It ...

platform, which brought a greater following and popularity to the League. To increase playing standards and game quality, the League amended its rules a year later to allow teams to include five imported players on their roster. By 1996, the Budweiser League had become more stable and comprised 13 teams, all of which were based in England and five of which were located in and around London (

Crystal Palace Crystal Palace may refer to: Places Canada * Crystal Palace Complex (Dieppe), a former amusement park now a shopping complex in Dieppe, New Brunswick * Crystal Palace Barracks, London, Ontario * Crystal Palace (Montreal), an exhibition building * ...

, Hemel Royals, Leopards,

London Towers London Towers were a professional basketball team based in London, England. They enjoyed considerable success in the 1990s and early 2000s, collecting 3 titles in the British Basketball League (BBL) as well as regularly competing in European c ...

and

Thames Valley Tigers Thames Valley Tigers was a British professional basketball team that competed in the British Basketball League (BBL) until 2005, when funding was ceased and the franchise folded. Based in Bracknell, Berkshire, the team's fans set up a new team to ...

). The capital city enjoyed huge success throughout this period with Towers taking the 1996 League crown and Leopards scoring back-to-back League titles in 1997 and 1998 – where they won via head-to-head results over second placed Birmingham Bullets after both teams finished with 58 points. The spell of dominance from the South was broken by Birmingham's two Championship Final's victories in 1996 and 1998, against the Towers and Thames Valley Tigers respectively. The 1998–99 season saw a new addition to the League with the expansion of Edinburgh Rocks, who became the League's first Scottish-based team since Glasgow Rangers' and Livingston's participation in 1989. The 1999 Budweiser League title came down to a final game between title-chasing rivals Sheffield and

Manchester Giants The Manchester Giants are a British professional basketball team based in Manchester, England. The franchise was established in 2011, and admitted to the top-tier British Basketball League in 2012. The team's formation was led by a consortium ...

in front of more than 11,000 fans at Manchester's

MEN Arena Manchester Arena, currently referred to as the AO Arena for sponsorship reasons, is an indoor arena in Manchester, England, immediately north of the Manchester city centre, city centre and partly above Manchester Victoria station in air rights s ...

. With both teams tied on points at the top of the League table, and tied at 85–85 with just 3.5 seconds left in the game,

Terrell Myers Terrell Myers (born August 28, 1974 in New Haven, Connecticut) is an American professional basketball player. Terrell attended James Hillhouse after graduation then attended St. Thomas More Prep school in Waterbury, Connecticut, followed by Sain ...

' last-gasp 18-foot buzzer-beating jump-shot claimed the regular season title for Sheffield. However it was the third-seed London Towers who went all the way in the post-season play-offs and took home the Championship crown. Another change of sponsorship in 1999 saw the competition renamed as the Dairylea Dunkers Championship, whilst the League radically changed its structure to incorporate a conference-based system. The League's 13 teams were geographically divided into two conferences – seven teams in the North and six teams in the South – with the top four-placed teams in each conference advancing to the play-offs. Towers had dominated the South, whilst Giants gained revenge on Sheffield, pipping them to the Northern Conference crown. The Northern and Southern winner's were kept apart throughout the play-offs until the Final, where Manchester went on to beat Birmingham for the post-season title. The new millennium saw yet another name change as the competition was rebranded as the British Basketball League Championship following the end of Darylea's sponsorship in 2000 and the 2000–01 season saw one of the biggest upsets in BBL history as

Leicester Riders Leicester Riders are a British professional basketball team and the oldest club in the British Basketball League (BBL). Established in 1967, the club have played in various locations around Leicestershire before moving to their current purpose- ...

, who finished with a 17–19 record in the regular season and were the lowest seeded team in the play-offs, went all the way to take the Championship silverware with a 75–84 in the Final over Sheffield. Following that season the League's TV broadcasting deal transferred from BSkyB to

ITV Digital ITV Digital was a British digital terrestrial television broadcaster which launched a pay-TV service on the world's first digital terrestrial television network. Its main shareholders were Carlton Communications plc and Granada plc, owners o ...

in a three-year contract agreement. Just months later the Manchester Giants became the first franchise to be removed from the competition by League officials due to unfulfilling a fixture and a lack of finance. The 2001–02 season was a remarkable one for minor North-east club

Chester Jets The Cheshire Phoenix are a professional basketball team based in Ellesmere Port, England. Founded in 1984, they are members of the British Basketball League and play their home games at the Cheshire Oaks Arena. From 1993 until 2015 the team was ...

who were victorious in all four BBL competitions, winning the Northern Conference title, as well as the Play-off Championship, the

BBL Trophy The British Basketball League Trophy, often shortened to the BBL Trophy, is an annual cup competition for British basketball teams organised by the United Kingdom's top professional league, the British Basketball League. It is one of two peripher ...

and the

National Cup The English National Cup is an annual basketball knock-out competition held between professional, semi-professional and amateur teams from the various divisions of the National Basketball League. For most of the competition's history, the draw has ...

. The accomplishment was dubbed the "Jetwash" by fans and the media, and had last been achieved by the former Kingston franchise in 1992. By the end of the campaign though, the BBL had lost another franchise following

Derby Storm Derby Storm was a former British Basketball League (BBL) franchise from the city of Derby, Derbyshire. The team took the decision to sit out the 2002–03 British Basketball League season, 2002–03 season after failing to find a suitable venue f ...

's decision to withdraw, and the collapse of ITV Digital during the summer of 2002 brought financial instability to the League and due to the decreased membership, the competition abolished its Conference structure and returned to a single league format. Scottish Rocks went on to win the 2003 Championship title becoming the first non-English team to win since Glasgow Rangers 14 years earlier. With the loss of the Leopards franchise in 2003, the Championship now consisted of just 10 teams.

Plymouth Raiders The Plymouth Raiders was a professional basketball team based in Plymouth, England. The team competed in the British Basketball League, the country's premier basketball competition. The club was founded in 1983 through a merger between two lo ...

, a powerhouse of the lower divisions, stepped up to the BBL in 2004 and joined as the Championship's eleventh team. The withdrawal of Thames Valley Tigers in 2005 brought about another membership shake-up as Tigers fans, determined not to lose professional basketball in their locality, established the

Guildford Heat The Surrey Scorchers are an English professional basketball team based in Guildford, Surrey, that compete in the British Basketball League. The team was established in 2005 as the Guildford Heat by fans of former British Basketball League te ...

as the BBL's first supporter-owned franchise. The 2005–06 season saw

Newcastle Eagles The Newcastle Eagles are a professional basketball team based in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. Playing in the top-tier British Basketball League and holding the franchise for Tyne & Wear, they are the most successful team in the League's histor ...

enjoy their most successful season to date and as they joined Chester and Kingston as the only teams to win a "grand slam" of League, Play-off, BBL Trophy and Cup titles in the same season. The summer of 2006 saw major upheaval within the BBL's membership as three long-standing franchises – Birmingham Bullets, Brighton Bears and London Towers – all withdrew from the League. With no BBL representation from the country's two biggest cities (Birmingham and London), the League elected lower division teams London United and Midlands-based

Worcester Wolves The Worcester Wolves are a basketball club in Worcester, England, Worcester, England. The team plays in the National Basketball League (England), NBL Division 2, the third tier of British basketball. The club was formed in 2000, and from 2006 u ...

to keep the number of teams at 10 for the upcoming season. United's stay within the BBL lasted only for one season as they too would be forced to withdraw prior to the start of the 2007–08 season due to the loss of its major sponsor. However the Championship saw the addition of three more teams prior to the season tip-off, with

English Basketball League The National Basketball League, or NBL for short, is a league competition representing semi-professional and amateur basketball clubs from England and Wales. It forms levels 2 to 4 on the British basketball pyramid, in line with the Scottish B ...

team London Capital stepping-up and new franchises

Birmingham Panthers The Birmingham Panthers (official name Team Birmingham Panthers) was a professional basketball club based in the city of Birmingham, England . Established in 2007, the franchise competed in Britain's top-tier league, the British Basketball Leagu ...

and

Everton Tigers The Mersey Tigers were a professional basketball team based in the city of Liverpool, England. The club was established in 2007 as a start-up franchise of the British Basketball League, the country's elite competition. The Tigers started compe ...

bringing the number of competing teams to 12. This kick-started another period of instability which saw no fewer than 12 new expansion franchises being drafted in over a period seven years (until 2014), six of which later withdrew or folded due to various issues. Newcastle continued their dynasty of success by claiming a further five Championship titles in seven seasons, from 2005 to 2012, along with many other accolades. Only

in 2008 and Everton/Mersey Tigers, in 2010 and 2011, were able to break their run. Challenging Newcastle's dominance were Leicester Riders who, despite finishing as Finalists in 2012 to Eagles, claimed a treble the following season with victories in the League, Championship Play-offs and BBL Cup.

Format

Regular season

The competition features all member teams playing a 30-game regular season (in a

round robin Round-robin may refer to: Computing * Round-robin DNS, a technique for dealing with redundant Internet Protocol service hosts * Round-robin networks, communications networks made up of radio nodes organized in a mesh topology * Round-robin schedu ...

format), from September through to April. Matches are played according to

FIBA The International Basketball Federation (FIBA ; French: ) is an association of national organizations which governs the sport of basketball worldwide. Originally known as the (hence FIBA), in 1989 it dropped the word ''amateur'' from its na ...

rules and games consist of four quarters of 10 minutes each. Two points are awarded for a win, with

overtime Overtime is the amount of time someone works beyond normal working hours. The term is also used for the pay received for this time. Normal hours may be determined in several ways: *by custom (what is considered healthy or reasonable by society), ...

used if the score is tied at the final buzzer – unlimited numbers of 5 minute overtime periods are played until one team is ahead when a period ends. At the end of the regular season, the team with the most points is crowned as winners of the BBL Championship, and thus British Champions. If points are equal between two or more teams then head-to-head results between said teams are used to determine the winners. In the case of a tie between multiple teams where this does not break the tie, the winners are then determined by the points difference in the games between said teams. Following the completion of the Championship regular season, the top-eight ranked teams advance into the post-season Championship Play-offs which usually take place during April. In the regular season, team schedules are not identical and neither are matchdays, with games scheduled mainly around venue availability. Because of this, teams may find themselves playing a series of home games consecutively followed by a straight set of away games. As the season is also particularly short many games are played over weekends as ' doubleheaders, whereby a team will play games (possibly a home and away game) on consecutive days, something that is not commonplace in British sports, although often seen in the

National Basketball Association The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United S ...

and other North American sports.

Play-offs

The post-season Championship Play-offs usually takes place in April and May, featuring the top eight ranked teams from the regular season compete in a

knockout tournament A knockout (abbreviated to KO or K.O.) is a fight-ending, winning criterion in several full-contact combat sports, such as boxing, kickboxing, muay thai, mixed martial arts, karate, some forms of taekwondo and other sports involving striking ...

. Teams are seeded depending on their final positioning in the Championship standings, so first-place faces eighth-place, second versus seventh-place, third against sixth-place and finally fourth plays the fifth-placed team. Both the Quarter-finals and the succeeding Semi-finals are played over a two-game series (home & away) with the higher seed having choice of home advantage in the either the first or second leg – an aggregated score over the two games will determine which team will advance to the next stage. As with the Quarter-Finals, teams in the Semi-Finals are also seeded, with the highest-ranking team drawn against the lowest-ranking team in one Semi-final and the two remaining teams drawn together in the other Semi-final. The culmination of the post-season is the Grand Final, held at

The O2 Arena The O2 Arena, commonly known as the O2 (stylised as The O2 arena), is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the centre of the O2 entertainment complex on the Greenwich Peninsula in southeast London. It opened in its present form in 2007. It has the s ...

in London, which sees the two Semi-final winners play a one-game event to determine the BBL Championship winners.

Sponsorship

Throughout its history the competition has been sponsored by several businesses, which have resulted in the trophy being renamed in accordance with the sponsor's branding.

Play-off Finals

Honours board

References

External links

BBL Championship
on the BBL's official website. {{DEFAULTSORT:BBL Cup Basketball leagues in Europe British Basketball League Professional sports leagues in the United Kingdom