Thirteen teams make their tournament debuts Friday, in games that will count toward regular season records—part of a gambit to draw more interest to the early weeks of the NBA season.
Topline
The second slate of NBA In-Season Tournament games tip off Friday night, bringing unconventional court designs, new uniforms and up to $500,000 in incentives for the winning players and coaches — a format designed to draw more viewership and interest to the early phase of the league’s regular season, months before anticipation starts to build for the playoffs.Key Facts
All 30 NBA teams are participating in the 67-game tournament over the next few weeks: Each team will play four games in a group stage, and the top eight contenders will advance to a knockout round that leads up to semifinals and an early December championship in Las Vegas, the winner of which are awarded the new “NBA Cup.”
The tournament takes place in parallel with the standard NBA season: All tournament match-ups will also count as regular-season games except the championship, factoring into the standings used to determine which teams make the NBA Playoffs in the spring.
Teams’ schedules will still include non-tournament games over the next few weeks, with matches that count toward the tournament taking place on Tuesdays and Fridays.
Players and coaches on the team that wins the NBA Cup will get $500,000—a figure that will descend based on teams placement as runners-up ($200,000), semifinalists ($100,000) and quarterfinalists ($50,000), according to ESPN.
