
The day after the NBA brought a regular-season game to the O2, a different room in London hosted a different kind of audience. 250 invite-only guests gathered at the Raffles Hotel for private briefings on the NBA’s plans for Europe. In one sense, the event worked. Not because a league was announced, or because clubs

The opening night of the second season of the SLB was meant to be about the basketball. Six teams took the floor with refreshed rosters and a summer of preparation, eager to prove the league was more than an improvised debut. Instead, it arrived in the shadow of refereeing uncertainty and FIBA intervention. When the