Basketball Africa League 6th season tips off Friday March 27

Season six of the Basketball Africa League (BAL) will tip off on Friday, March 27, at the SunBet Arena in Pretoria, South Africa.

The 2026 BAL finals will take place at BK Arena in Kigali, Rwanda, on Sunday, May 31.

The 2026 BAL season will feature the top 12 club teams from 12 African countries playing 42 games in Pretoria, Rabat, Morocco, and Kigali.

“Returning to South Africa, Morocco and Rwanda for our sixth season speaks to the strong sporting cultures and rapidly growing basketball ecosystems in those countries,” Amadou Gallo Fall, BAL president, stated.

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According to him, the 12 teams will be divided into two conferences of six teams each.

Each conference will play a 15-game group phase during which each team will face the other five teams in its conference once.

The Kalahari Conference group phase will take place from Friday, March 27, to Sunday, April 5, in Pretoria.

The Sahara Conference group phase will take place from Friday, April 24 – Sunday, May 3, at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Sports Complex in Rabat.

Eight teams from across the two conferences will qualify for the Playoffs in Kigali from Friday, May 22 – May 31.

“The BAL continues to inspire fans across the continent and drive opportunities and global recognition for African talent,” Fall stated.

Anibal Manave, FIBA Africa president, stated that the league will showcase competition and energy on and off the court to a global audience when the season tips off.

“As we approach the tip-off of the sixth Basketball Africa League season, we can celebrate the league’s growing impact and the way this competition continues to elevate the game across the region,” Manave stated.

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In addition to the games, the BAL will celebrate the convergence of basketball and African culture through music, fashion, lifestyle and entertainment that surrounds the game.

The league will also collaborate with its partners to host basketball development and social impact programming in the three host markets as well as Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal, including youth, coach and referee clinics, children’s literacy and educational initiatives, and media networking.

On June 14, 2025, Libya’s Alahli Tripoli became the first Libyan team to win the BAL Finals after previous champions from Angola, Egypt and Tunisia.

The 2025 BAL season reached fans in 214 countries and territories in 17 languages, set an attendance record of more than 140,000 fans, and generated more than 1.2 billion impressions across NBA and BAL social media channels.

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