The Women's British Basketball League (WBBL) was the top-level women's

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 (appro ...

league League or The League may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band * ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football * ''League of Legends'', a 2009 multiplayer online battle a ...

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...

, founded on 5 June 2014 as the women's counterpart to the

British Basketball League The British Basketball League (BBL) was a men's professional basketball sports league, league in Great Britain. Since its establishment in 1987 the BBL represented the highest level of basketball competition within the United Kingdom. The orga ...

(BBL). The league's headquarters sat in

Leicester Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area, and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest city in the East Midlands with a popula ...

alongside the offices of the men's BBL. It was replaced by

Super League Basketball Super League Basketball (SLB) is a men's professional basketball sports league, league. Established in 2024, the competition replaces the former British Basketball League (BBL) as the top-level men's basketball competition in Great Britain. Hist ...

like the men’s competition. Like the BBL, the organisation used a franchise-based system so there is no

promotion and relegation Promotion and relegation is used by sports leagues as a process where teams can move up and down among divisions in a league system, based on their performance over a season. Leagues that use promotion and relegation systems are sometimes call ...

between the WBBL and the English Women's Basketball League, which forms the lower divisions. Along with the WBBL Championship and the post-season Play-offs, it also ran two knockout competitions featuring all WBBL member teams - the WBBL Cup and WBBL Trophy.

History

Officially approved by the

and England Basketball, the newly created Women's British Basketball League was announced to the public on 5 June 2014, and the 2014–15 season was the league's first full season of competition. The initial line-up included pre-existing teams from

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

and

Wales Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...

, competing in a franchise-based organisation similar to the men's British Basketball League model, with no promotion or relegation in operation with the lower leagues. All eight teams from the pre-existing English Basketball League Division One (Women) competition were selected as member clubs, as well as the two finalists from the 2014 Division Two (Women) Play-offs, Brixton Lady TopCats and

Leeds Beckett University Leeds Beckett University (LBU), formerly known as Leeds Metropolitan University (LMU) and before that as Leeds Polytechnic, is a public university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It has campuses in the Leeds city centre, city centre and Hea ...

. Since the league's inauguration, both Leeds and Brixton have resigned from the league, but three new clubs have joined in that time, including the league's first member club from

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

Teams

Former teams

Competitions

WBBL Championship

The WBBL Championship is the flagship competition of the Women's British Basketball League and features all member teams playing a 22-game regular season (in a round robin format), from October through to April. Matches are played according to

FIBA The International Basketball Federation (FIBA ; French language, French: ) is an association of national organizations which governs the sport of basketball worldwide. FIBA defines the rules of basketball, specifies the Basketball equipment ...

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

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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 WBBL 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 Play-offs which usually take place during April.

WBBL Playoffs

The post-season Playoffs usually takes place in April, featuring the top eight ranked teams from the WBBL Championship regular season compete in a

knockout tournament A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...

. 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 1st or 2nd 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, a one-off game played at the end of April, where the winners will be crowned as Play-off Champions.

Betty Codona Trophy

The WBBL Trophy, now officially the Betty Codona Trophy, is an annual pool stage and

featuring all WBBL member clubs. For the first two seasons, pairings were drawn completely at random – there were no

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, and a draw took place after the majority of fixtures have been played in each round. A preliminary round took place between the lowest-finishing teams in the previous league season, so that the tournament proper started with eight teams in the first round. From the 2016-17 season, the format was revamped, splitting the teams into a number of geographical groups. The top teams from each group qualify for the semi-finals, which are played as straight knockout ties.

WBBL Cup

The WBBL Cup is an annual knockout competition featuring all WBBL member clubs. It is a straight knockout competition.

Betty Codona Classic

The Betty Codona Classic was an annual three-day tournament named in honour of Betty Codona

OBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

, a stalwart of women's basketball in Britain for over 50 years and founder of the country's first women's team,

Sheffield Hatters The Sheffield Hatters are a women's basketball club from Sheffield, England. The club have been mainstays of the women's game in England for many years, having celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2011, and were founder members of the profess ...

. The competition was originally set up as an independent event for the top clubs in Women's basketball and predates the creation of the WBBL by a year, but was adopted as an official WBBL competition after the league was established. The original format featured the top eight-placed WBBL teams after the first 8 games of regular season play. For the 2016/2017 edition, the competition was moved to become the opening event for the WBBL season, resulting in a two-tiered format where the Classic Cup was contested by the top four from the previous season's league, with fifth to eighth placed teams from last year's league competing for the Classic Plate.

Individual awards

The WBBL concludes each season with a number of individual awards based on overall performance from the year. The three end-of-season awards are; MVP Award (Most Valuable Player - which proposes the player with the best performance over the year); the Young Player of the Year (the best performance of a younger player usually at the age before or during university); and Coach of the Year (the coach with the best performance over the season). The WBBL also awards MVP Awards for the Playoffs, Trophy and Cup finals. In addition, 'Team of the Year' and 'Defensive Team of the Year' places are awarded to demonstrate the best five players in the league as well as the best five defensively players of the year in the league.

References

External links

*Official websites: *
Official WBBL website
*
The WBBL
on

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*
The WBBL
on

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{{Women's professional basketball leagues Basketball leagues in the United Kingdom

Britain Britain most often refers to: * Great Britain, a large island comprising the countries of England, Scotland and Wales * The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a sovereign state in Europe comprising Great Britain and the north-eas ...

Women's basketball competitions in the United Kingdom Professional sports leagues in the United Kingdom 2014 establishments in the United Kingdom Sports leagues established in 2014