Rethinking BSL basketball

With the season wrapped up, we ask: How can BSL basketball be better in Year 3? Our senior columnist, Jason Winders, has some ideas to improve game play, the fan experience, and the league’s professionalism …

(Photo: Matt Hiscox Photography).

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We’re two years into the Basketball Super League (BSL), and things are trending up. There’s elevated talent, legit competition, and a leaguewide growth mindset. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The BSL isn’t perfect.

Here are a few suggestions on how the league can level up in three key areas (game play, fan experience, and communication) in Year 3:

GAME PLAY

Is this thing on? | Look, nobody likes a mystery foul, especially not the fans and broadcasters who are out here guessing like they’re playing Clue. Was it a hand-check? A flop? Or maybe just a Jamestown referee thing? Who knows! Mic the stripes and have them announce calls to the crowd (and the viewing audience online) directly.

Up to the challenge | Look, we see bad calls every year. It’s part of the game. But Jamestown referees redefined bad calls this year, culminating with an embarrassing series of misses in a Jamestown-Sudbury matchup that resulted in the league admitting the whole thing was botched.

It’s time to fix it. Give coaches one “strategic override” – they can challenge any call or non-call, including goaltending, shot clock violations, charges, missed moving screens, or anything that a Jamestown official can think up. That provides coaches with meaningful influence.

Bonus system | Let’s encourage clean defense, punish lazy fouling and force teams to think ahead. Replace traditional team foul bonuses with a tiered reward system: 5 team fouls = 1-and-1; 7 fouls = 2 shots; 10 fouls = 2 shots + possession. The possession bonus at 10 fouls is a game-changer late.

Rethink OT | Add some urgency and spice. Adopt the Elam Ending for any game that goes into OT. You’ll see this in G League play. If the game is tied after regulation, shut off the clock and the first team to score seven points in the overtime period will win. For example, if the game is 95-95, set the target score at 102.

(Photo: Matt Hiscox Photography).

FAN EXPERIENCE

Fix the stream | The BSL TV broadcast quality varies so wildly from venue to venue that watching the BSL sometimes feels like clicking through a 2005 RealPlayer playlist. As a next step, I would love to see the league make an app or cut a deal and hijack one of those cable channels that plays Australian Rules Football.

While it’s great the BSL expanded this year, bringing over three former TBL teams, the level of professionalism took a dip. Putting the size of gyms aside, the broadcasts left a lot to be desired. A game in Pontiac featured an announcer without a roster sheet, referring to players simply by jersey number. Broadcasts in Jamestown had the feel of frat boys cheering for the home side – without any semblance of objectivity. Broadcasts in Windsor, London, KW and Sudbury remained professional. But the others? Not so much.

Celebrate the game | I know it’s cheesy, but damn did I miss the All-Star Weekend this year. I get it; schedules are a nightmare and booking some of these arenas during hockey season is a near impossibility. But a guy can dream, right?

OK, then let’s rethink the entire idea of what an all-star game can be. Here’s my pitch:

The BSL Next Up Festival is a one-day, all-out celebration of basketball, music, and community. Held in a rotating BSL city each year, the festival blends high-level hoops with live music, youth clinics, food, art, and fashion – turning the midseason break into a block party with purpose. From morning skills sessions with local kids, maybe even a job fair for local teens to meet local industries, to a DJ-backed 3v3 showcase, to player-performed concerts and pop-up markets featuring local-owned brands, Next Up is the league showing up, showing love, and putting hoops culture front and centre.

(Photo: Matt Hiscox Photography).

Put a jersey on it | The BSL has some genuinely cool uniforms (and warmups). So why is the merch game so lame and hard to come by? Create a league store that actually works (and, you know, shows the actual products instead of weird cartoon drawings). Let fans rep their team without having to find a guy who knows a guy. Drop some local collabs, limited runs, vintage nods – make BSL gear part of the conversation, not an afterthought.

Dead zone | The minute the Finals end, the BSL vanishes like it’s in witness protection. Give us something: A docuseries. A draft show. Mic’d-up training camp diaries. Anything that keeps the league alive in the off-season. Fans don’t follow silence.

COMMUNICATION

We just don’t talk anymore | You’re not a sad Millennial mom desperate for attention or a Boomer looking to spread some misinformation about immigrants – you’re a professional basketball league. So, quit posting all your league news on Instagram and Facebook only and develop a proper communication strategy with media and fans.

That starts with your website, basketballsuperleague.com, which has a News section (last updated on Jan. 26, as of this writing) and a Transaction section (last updated on March 28).

(Photo: Matt Hiscox Photography).

Want to let fans know where players are coming and going? Post it to your website.

Want to announce league awards? You know what to do!

Want to announce league suspensions? Post it to your website.

And speaking of social media, it’s just a bad look when a league account is treated as a personal one. It’s great when David Magley gets to meet up with old friends, but it’s not league news. No offense intended, but the BSL – and TBL – accounts shouldn’t be Magley family accounts. If the leagues want to be taken more seriously, this will change in the future.

Go directly to jail | It isn’t the league’s fault there will be on- and off-court behaviour requiring discipline, fines, and suspensions. Blood runs hot during competition. It happens.

What is the league’s fault, however, is the completely clumsy way they hand out discipline, fines, and suspensions – and then explain them.

We saw that in London with the season-long suspension of Chris Jones. Lots of words. Not a lot of clarity. Up front, publish the league rules and post it to the website, along with the penalties for each infraction, and then cite as it happens. These should not be case-by-case.

Regulators, mount up | OK, let’s put a little teeth into the end of the season.

Let’s install a BSL-TBL promotion/relegation system. Each season, the bottom team in the BSL is relegated to the TBL, while the top TBL team earns promotion to the BSL. TBL teams qualify through regional play and a postseason tournament, adding high-stakes drama and giving emerging markets a pathway to the national stage.

This system rewards excellence, weeds out lesser BSL teams, and keeps eyes on both ends of the standings all season long.