After years of planning, the NBA announced they would introduce a new in-season tournament called the “NBA Cup.”
“This concept has been rumbling around the league office for around fifteen years,” said NBA Commissioner Adam Silver on NBA Today. “We thought, ‘What a perfect opportunity for a global league like the NBA, and it’s a perfect fit for our game.’ New traditions take time. But, throughout sports, we are seeing new innovations, and now is the time for this NBA in-season tournament.”
The winning team’s players will walk away with $500,000 each and the coveted NBA Cup. The second-place team’s players will also get $200,000 each. An award will also be given out for the MVP of the tournament.
The league split up all teams into six groups: three for the East and three for the West.
The tournament games will be played throughout November and December, intermixed with the regular season games. The tournament games will also be counted towards each team’s regular season records, except for the championship itself.
They will be playing on alternate designs for every team’s courts to differentiate the games that count towards the tournament from the rest of the run-of-the-mill NBA games.
In November, the teams will all participate in the tournament’s first stage for four games. The winners of the groups will move on to the knockout rounds. After that, it’s the quarterfinals, semifinals, and championships.
The tournament is strategically placed in the most dead part of the NBA schedule in an attempt to keep fans watching.
The idea took great inspiration from in-season soccer tournaments common in Europe. The difference lies in the fact that the results of the games will directly affect each team’s records for the season and, ultimately, their playoff seeding and schedules. This was a very intentional decision to give the teams and players proper incentive to try, outside of the winning team’s players getting half a million dollars.
The first round began on Nov. 3. The quarterfinals will take place on Dec. 4 and 5, the semifinals on Dec. 7, and the championship on Dec. 9 in Las Vegas, NV.