The best way, which is also the most used strategy to promote basketball is the organization of different leagues.
The leagues help the players gain more basketball experience, and the leagues also showcase the skills of the different basketball players that participate in the said league, which may also inspire the young ones to play basketball.
The major professional basketball league in Austria is the Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga or OBL. The Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga means The Austrian Basketball League in Enlgish.
A Brief History
The Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga was founded in the year 1947. The name of the said league then was A-Liga, which means A-Leauge in English. In the season 2008-2009 the league’s name was changed to Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga.
After the 2008-2009 season, the league was also recognized as the Admiral Basketball League, the name’s league was after the league’s main sponsor, Admiral Sportwetten. The league is still known as the Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga up until now.
Some of the League’s Information
The teams that participate in the Osterreichische Basketball Bundesliga are composed mostly of Austrians, but there are other teams that have some international players, also known as imports, which are mostly Americans.
The league is composed of 12 different teams, and each team plays against the other eleven teams twice, which means that there are a total of 22 games in the first round of the tournament. After the elimination stage, the best eight teams continue to the second round, and they eight teams will play agianst each other using the double round robin.
After the second round, the four best, or should I say tough teams, advances to the best of five semi-finals series. The two teams that won in the semi-finals will advance to the finals, which is also a best of five series. Just like the NBA, the Osterreichische Basketball Bundelsiga holds an All-Star Game every year. Some of the activities of the All-Star Game are the Slam Dunk contests and three-point shooting competition.
The Osterreichische Basketball Bundelsiga Teams
As stated above, the league is composed of twelve different basketball teams. These twelve teams are the following: Allianz Swans Gmunden, the BasketBlubs Vienna, the BSC Raiffeisen Panthers Furstenfeld, the Kapfenberg Bulls, the Kelag Worthersee Piraten, the Oberwart Gunners, the UBC okoStadt Gussing Knights, the UBC St. Polten, the UBSC PBS Graz, the WBC Kraftwerk Wels, and lastly, the Xion Dukes Klosterneuburg.
The Kapfenberg Bulls won the championship for four consecutive years: in 2001-2002 against kelag Worthersee Piraten, in 2002-2003 against BSC Raiffeisen Panthers Furstenfeld, and in 2003-2004 and 2004-2005 against the Allianz Swans Gmunden.
Finally, after two consecutive years of being the runner up, the Allianz Swans Gmunden became the champions for three consecutive years: in 2004-2005 against the Macabido Gunners Oberwart, in 2005-2006 against WBC Kraftwerk Wels, and in 2006-2007 against the Macabido Gunners Oberwart, the next season, 2007-2008, the champions were the BSC Raiffeisen Panthers Furstenfeld, and in the year 2008-2009 and recently, 2009-2010, the Allianz Swans Gmunden regained their title as the champions of the Osterreichische Basketball Bundelsiga.
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