Silver told reporters before Friday’s kick-off in Abu Dhabi that they were “particularly excited about” the opportunity in the Gulf Region. “We’ve had a long-standing presence in this market. Games are televised since about 35 years.”
“The game is probably 100-years old here in the Middle East… Today, we’re the second-most-popular sport after football and the fastest-growing sport in the world, in terms of basketball.
“We’re very excited to see the increase in girls and young woman playing.”
I was at NYU Abu Dhabi Campus [New York University], where we have a program called ‘Her Time To Play’.
“We had approximately 130 girls, 11-14 years old… There were two components to the program; there was about an hour spent in conversation with these players about the values of the game, life skills, importance of hard work and respect for the game, dedication to your craft and then an hour on the court, in terms of basketball experience.
“We have had the opportunity in the past week to connect with more that 7,000 kids through our Jr. NBA & Jr. WNBA Basketball programs. This includes 450 coaches. Some are based here and some have travelled to the United States for this experience.
“From our point of view, it’s been a very successful project so far.”
The NBA and Middle East are strengthening their relationship. The NBA Abu Dhabi Games has been joined by the Jr. NBA/WNBA, NBA Basketball School and NBA Basketball School Programs. UAE airline Emirates is also the Global Airline Partner and Title Partner of Emirates NBA Cup.
Mark Tatum, NBA’s Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum, believes this is just the beginning. He said: “I believe the number of partnerships you’re going see here in the area will grow. Emirates has been a great partner in the region with the new NBA Cup.
We are partnering with the Qatar Foundation for grassroots programs. We also have Jr. NBA in Qatar programs for boys and girls. BeIN is a long-standing partner of ours in the Middle East and North Africa.
“I think that the partnerships we develop here are local companies Aldar and ADQ also investing in basketball.” I believe that will continue over the next 5 years.
Silver’s main focus was to increase the number of opportunities for players and coaches. He wanted to make the most of Abu Dhabi’s status as a “sports and entertainment hub for all of the region”, potentially bringing a top-notch academy to the UAE.
He said: “We are focused on some elite coaching here. Abu Dhabi has become a sports and entertainment hub for the whole region, we see an opportunity potentially with an elite academy here to bring in young people from the region broadly described… and take some of the best youth players and bring them here to train together, to develop to play at the highest levels for their national teams and potentially in professional competition.”
Abu Dhabi is not only awash with NBA stars. Tatum is particularly proud of the growth in participation in Jr. NBA/WNBA Leagues in the UAE. He said: I think the main learning was that if you invested in the community, if you gave kids the opportunity to learn basketball, you would see a great impact.
“That’s part of the partnership.” When we first met with Abu Dhabi, we didn’t just talk about the games. We talked about the activities that we would create around the Games. They understood that getting more kids active and playing basketball was a good idea. We started the Jr. NBA program for girls and boys in that first season.
“Participation has increased by 60 per cent in UAE. There are 120 Jr. NBA teams, up from 90 last season. Those are the things for governments around the world, Abu Dhabi is saying ‘that’s a good thing for us’.”
