The National Basketball League has "continued its successful partnership with the China Basketball Association," according to Roy Ward of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. The CBA will send Zhejiang CB Golden Bulls and Tianjin Ronggang Gold Lions to next month's NBL preseason tournament "which will now be known as the Australian Basketball Challenge." The format of the tournament will "remain largely the same with all clubs getting three games each ahead of their respective seasons with the NBL set to start in early October and the CBA usually tipping off in November." NBL GM Jeremy Loeliger said that the league "planned for the tournament to expand" and include teams from the U.S. and Europe. Loeliger said, "In the future we see the ABC being a competition that involves teams from around the globe including the United States, Asia and Europe. We already have very strong interest from all three regions for next year's competition, which is already in the works." The NBL will also "live stream all Bulls and Lions games from the tournament into China giving the NBL clubs involved exposure to the nation's rapidly growing basketball supporter base" (SMH, 8/18).
