National Basketball League (New Zealand)
The National Basketball League, often abbreviated to the NBL, is the pre-eminent professional men's basketball league in New Zealand.
Nine clubs competed in the 2012 season with teams based in Auckland, Dunedin, Invercargill, Nelson, New Plymouth, Palmerston North, Taradale and Wellington. The Christchurch Cougars voluntarily sat out the 2012 season, as they did the 2011 because of the financial implications of the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, however they intend to re-enter the competition in 2013.
The league has a limit of two imports per side. Many of the imports used come from the United States. The league also only allows one naturalised New Zealand player per team.
The quality of play in the league continues to improve as more and more New Zealand players are playing higher levels of basketball like college, ANBL and some even go onto make the NBA such as former North Harbour Kings star Kirk Penney.
Televised games have decreased since 2007 when TVNZ's television rights were sold to Sky TV, games were originally shown once a week but due to lack of demand only playoff games were shown mainly due Super Rugby, NRL and ANZ Championship games clashing with game times and a high interest by the public in those competitions. Southland Sharks highlights and interviews have been shown on Cue TV.
Read more about National Basketball League (New Zealand): History, Current Clubs, Former and Defunct Clubs, Competition Format, Broadcasting Details, Imports in The League, New Zealanders in The League, List of Champions
Famous quotes containing the words national, basketball and/or league:
“[Wellesley College] is about as meaningful to the educational process in America as a perfume factory is to the national economy.”
—Nora Ephron (b. 1941)
“Perhaps basketball and poetry have just a few things in common, but the most important is the possibility of transcendence. The opposite is labor. In writing, every writer knows when he or she is laboring to achieve an effect. You want to get from here to there, but find yourself willing it, forcing it. The equivalent in basketball is aiming your shot, a kind of strained and usually ineffective purposefulness. What you want is to be in some kind of flow, each next moment a discovery.”
—Stephen Dunn (b. 1939)
“He will deliver you from six troubles; in seven no harm shall touch you. In famine he will redeem you from death, and in war from the power of the sword. You shall be hidden from the scourge of the tongue, and shall not fear destruction when it comes. At destruction and famine you shall laugh, and shall not fear the wild animals of the earth. For you shall be in league with the stones of the field, and the wild animals shall be at peace with you.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Job 5:19-23.