Women's British Basketball League

History

Officially approved by the British Basketball League and England Basketball, the newly created Women's British Basketball League was announced to the public on 5 June 2014, and the 2014–15 Women's British Basketball League season was the league's first full season of competition.

The initial line-up included pre-existing teams from England and Wales, competing in a franchise-based organisation similar to the men's British Basketball League model, with no promotion or relegation in operation with the lower leagues. All eight teams from the pre-existing English Basketball League Division One (Women) competition were selected as member clubs, whilst the two finalists from the 2014 Division Two (Women) Play-offs, Brixton Lady TopCats and Leeds Beckett University, although Leeds resigned from the League after just a single season.

Board members

The Women's British Basketball League is run by a ten-person board, which takes all decisions regarding League policies, issues and rules. The director of each member club – or franchise as it is known – sits on the board, ensuring equal representation.

The current club representatives on the board of directors are:

WBBL Championship

The WBBL Championship is the flagship competition of the Women's British Basketball League and features all member teams playing an 18-game regular season (in a round robin format), from October through to April. Matches are played according to FIBA rules and games consist of four-quarters of 10 minutes each. Two points are awarded for a win, with overtime used if the score is tied at the final buzzer – unlimited numbers of 5-minute overtime periods are played until one team is ahead when a period ends. At the end of the regular season, the team with the most points is crowned as WBBL Champions. If points are equal between two or more teams then head-to-head results between said teams are used to determine the winners. In the case of a tie between multiple teams where this does not break the tie, the winners are then determined by the points difference in the games between said teams. Following the completion of the Championship regular season, the top eight ranked teams advance into the post-season Play-offs which usually take place during April.

Play-offs

The post-season Play-offs usually takes place in April, featuring the top eight ranked teams from the WBBL Championship regular season compete in a knockout tournament. Teams are seeded depending on their final positioning in the Championship standings, so first-place faces eighth-place, second versus seventh-place, third against sixth-place and finally fourth plays the fifth-placed team. Both the Quarter-finals and the succeeding Semi-finals are played over a two-game series (home & away) with the higher seed having choice of home advantage in the either the 1st or 2nd leg – an aggregated score over the two games will determine which team will advance to the next stage. As with the Quarter-finals, teams in the Semi-finals are also seeded, with the highest-ranking team drawn against the lowest-ranking team in one Semi-final and the two remaining teams drawn together in the other Semi-final. The culmination of the post-season is the grand Final, a one-off game played at the end of April, where the winners will be crowned as Play-off Champions.

WBBL Trophy

The WBBL Trophy is an annual pool stage and knockout tournament featuring all WBBL member clubs.

For the first two seasons, pairings were drawn completely at random – there were no seeds, and a draw takes place after the majority of fixtures have been played in each round. A preliminary round took place between the lowest-finishing teams in the previous league season, so that the tournament proper started with eight teams in the first round.

For the 2016-17 season, the format was revamped, splitting the ten teams into two equal geographical groups, North and South. The teams would play ever other team once home or away, with the top two teams from each group qualifying for the semi-finals, which are played as straight knockout ties. Also for the 2016-17 season, the final was moved to the Emirates Arena in Glasgow, and held in conjuction with the BBL Trophy final.

The first ever Trophy final was played at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham on 11 January 2015, and saw the Sheffield Hatters claim the inaugural Trophy 76-62 against the Nottingham Wildcats.

WBBL Cup

The WBBL Cup is a new annual knockout competition featuring all WBBL member clubs. It is a straight knockout competition.

For the 2016-17 season, new clubs Oakland Wolves and Caledonia Pride were joined in a preliminary round by the two lowest finishing teams of the previous season, Manchester Mystics and Cardiff Met Archers. The winners of these ties joined the highest 6 finishing clubs from the 2015-16 season in the quarter finals.

The winners of the inaugural WBBL Cup were the Manchester Mystics, who defeated the Nottingham Wildcats 71-60 in the final, held at the Barclaycard Arena in Birmingham.

Betty Codona Classic

The Betty Codona Classic is an annual three-day tournament named in honour of Betty Codona OBE, a stalwart of women's basketball in Britain for over 50 years and founder of the country's first women's team, Sheffield Hatters. The competition features the top eight-placed WBBL teams after the first 8 games of regular season play.

The first edition of the Classic to feature in the WBBL era took place on the 3-5 January 2015 at the Hatters' own All Saints Catholic High School's Sports Centre, and saw the Sheffield Hatters claim the title named after their founder for the first time, winning a close final 79-73 against the Nottingham Wildcats.

Future teams