04/06/08 The British Basketball League (BBL) is pleased to confirm the structure of their competitions - the BBL Championship & Playoffs, the BBL Cup, and the BBL Trophy - for the 2008/09 season, which begins in September. Of note are changes to the two peripheral competitions, the BBL Cup and the BBL Trophy, which will see a pre-drawn fixture tree and two-legged semi- finals in the former and a group stage consisting of four pools of three teams in the latter. The BBL Championship season will begin on Friday 26th September and the format will remain the same as the recently completed 2007/08 season. Teams will each play 33 regular season games, with sides meeting one another once at home, once away, and once home or away. Two league points are awarded for a win, and the top eight teams will progress to the BBL Championship Playoffs in April. In the event of two teams finishing on the same number of points at the end of the season, they will be separated according to the head-to-head record between them in league games during the season. The format for the post-season remains the same with the following one-off quarter-final games: 1st vs. 8th, 2nd vs. 7th, 3rd vs. 6th, 4th vs. 5th. The climax of the season will once more take place over the showpiece weekend in British basketball as the BBL Finals Weekend is held in May. Changes have been made to the BBL Cup, which is the straight knockout competition comprising the twelve BBL clubs. The competition fixtures will be drawn all at once according to a matrix-style system with six teams in each side of the draw, clubs will therefore have prior knowledge of who their prospective opponents will be in the next round. The top four teams in the 2007/08 BBL Championship table - Newcastle Eagles, Guildford Heat, Plymouth Raiders, MK Lions - will be seeded, with the first (Eagles) and fourth (Lions) seeds in one half of the draw and the second (Heat) and third (Raiders) seeds in the other, they will also receive a bye to the quarter- final stages; all remaining teams are unseeded and enter in the first round. The first round and quarter- finals will be one-off games, with the semi-finals being contested over two legs (home & away) and being decided according to aggregate score. The culmination of the BBL Cup will take place in a one-off game at a central venue in January, when the first piece of silverware of the season is handed out. The BBL Trophy competition will undergo minor changes ahead of the 2008/09 campaign. BBL clubs will be separated into four groups of three teams on a regional basis and will play each other home and away within their group. A fter each team has played their four group stage games, the top team from each group will progress to the knockout semi-finals, with the two winners going on to contest the final. The full fixture list, BBL Cup draw, and BBL Trophy groups, are due to be announced early in July. The Birmingham Panthers have had their franchise withdrawn by the BBL, and will therefore not operate in the 2008/09 season. The addition of the Worthing Thunder sees the league maintain a twelve-club structure.
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