The National Basketball Association (NBA) revealed today the details of the NBA In-Season Tournament, a new yearly competition that will include all 30 teams and make its debut during the regular season of the 2023–2024 basketball season.
The first-ever In-Season Tournament will begin on Friday, November 3, in NBA franchise markets and end with the Semifinals being played at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Thursday, December 7, and the Championship being played there on Saturday, December 9.
“We are excited to introduce the NBA In-Season Tournament as an opportunity to further enhance and innovate around our season structure,” said Joe Dumars, NBA Executive Vice President, Head of Basketball Operations. “The NBA In-Season Tournament provides us with the opportunity to further enhance and innovate around our season structure.” “With the addition of this new marquee event on the NBA calendar, we are focused on providing players and teams with another competition to win, engaging fans differently, and driving further interest in the early portion of the regular-season schedule.” “With the addition of this new marquee event on the NBA calendar,”
The In-Season Tournament will be split into the Group Play stage and the Knockout Rounds stage.
Group Play
According to information disclosed today on NBA Online Betting PH and explained below, all 30 teams have been randomly chosen into groups of five within their conference based on their win-loss records from the regular season of 2022-2023. On “Tournament Nights,” which will take place every Tuesday and Friday from November 3-28 (except for Election Day on Tuesday, November 7, when there will be no games played), each team will play four games designated for Group Play. These games will include one game against each opponent in the team’s group, as well as two games at home and two on the road. On Tournament Nights, the NBA will only play Group Play games; no other games will be played.
Knockout Rounds
There will be a total of eight teams moving on to the Knockout Rounds: the team that finished with the best record in Group Play games for each of the six groups, as well as two “wild card” teams, which are determined by the team from each conference that finished in second place in its group and had the best record overall in Group Play games. The Knockout Rounds will consist of single-elimination games in the Quarterfinals (played in NBA team cities on Monday, December 4, and Tuesday, December 5), Semifinals (played in Las Vegas on December 7 and December 9, respectively), and Championship (played in Las Vegas on December 7 and December 9). The Knockout teams will compete against one another for a prize fund and the NBA Cup, the new trophy for the In-Season Tournament.
The results of all 67 games played during the first and second phases of the In-Season Tournament will be factored into the rankings for the regular season, except for the Championship. During the 2023–24 season, each team will continue to compete in 82 regular-season games. This number of contests includes both games played during Group Play and those played during the Knockout Rounds.
There will be seven Knockout Round games and fourteen Group Play games that will be televised nationally. Each Tournament Night will feature two games. August will see the release of the announcements on the game and broadcast schedules for the In-Season Tournament Group Play stage. This page provides a summary of the schedule for the Group Play portion of the tournament.
Group Play Draw
A random drawing was used to divide the 15 teams that comprised each conference into three groups of five. This allowed the opponents each club would face during the Group Play games to be determined. The following are the groups:
Before the drawing, each team’s record from the previous regular season (2022-23) was used to determine its position in the “pot” for that team. Each conference had three pots, and one team from each bank was chosen at random to compete in each of the three groups that comprised that conference. The following describes each of the pots:
- Pot 1 consists of the three teams from a given conference that finished with the best records in the prior season.
- Pot 2 consists of the teams that finished 4th through 6th in the standings from the previous season.
- Pot 3 consists of the teams that finished 7th through 9th in the standings from the previous season.
- Pot 4 consists of teams that finished the previous season with the 10th-best record through the 12th-best record.
- Pot 5 consists of teams that finished the previous season with the 13th-through-15th-best records.
Knockouts Rounds
In each conference, the two clubs who finished Group Play with the best record will be responsible for hosting the Quarterfinal games, and the team that finished Group Play with the best record will be responsible for hosting the wild card team.
The 22 teams who did not qualify for the Knockout Rounds will each play two regular-season games during the Knockout Rounds on days (Wednesday, December 6, and Friday, December 8) when no games are planned for the In-Season Tourn These days are Wednesday and Friday. On December 8, each of the four clubs eliminated in the Quarterfinals will compete in a game that is part of their regular season schedule.
Prize Pool
For the 2023-24 NBA season, the following is the breakdown of how the prize fund for the In-Season Tournament will be distributed among the NBA players that are on teams that compete in the Knockout Rounds:
- Players on the championship team will each receive $500,000 in prize money.
- Players on the Championship team that ended up losing will each receive $200,000.
- Players on the losing team of the Semifinals will each receive $100,000.
- Players on the losing team in the Quarterfinals will each receive $50,000.
The League’s Honours
The National Basketball Association will determine the Most Valuable Player of the In-Season Tournament and the All-Tournament Team after the end of the In-Season Tournament. The players’ performance in both the Group Play and the Knockout Rounds will be considered throughout the selection process.
