Amadou Fall Growing African Basketball with New Pro League

Amadou Fall can now begin the work of developing basketball in Africa in earnest following his promotion this week.

Amadou Fall was named the president of the NBA’s new Basketball Africa League on Tuesday. He was previously the NBA vice president and managing director for Africa.

The BAL is a new professional basketball league for Africa that will commence in 2020. The league will consist of 12 teams from various leagues around Africa.

“I am extremely excited about the opportunity,” Fall said.

Want $250 to bet on the NBA Finals?

“I am grateful for the trust that NBA commissioner Adam Silver and deputy commissioner Mark Tatum have given me to lead this new initiative for the NBA in Africa that is also affiliated with FIBA. We’re looking forward to getting it off the ground. We’re working closely with FIBA to build a compelling property. There is tremendous opportunity to grow the game of basketball in Africa, which is why we opened our office in 2010.

“In the close to 10 years that we’ve been on the ground, we’ve made a lot of progress. We have a robust grassroots infrastructure.”

The BAL will be the first NBA basketball league outside of North America. Amadou Fall announced it’s conception during the 2019 NBA All-Star game.

The league will be formed with the top professional teams from Tunisia, Nigeria, Egypt, Morocco and Angola. Those teams will play around 40 games beginning in March, with a championship game in May 2020.

Six of the 12 teams involved will be the champions of their respective leagues. The other six will qualify via a FIBA tournament.

“We’re looking forward to now building the entire ecosystem,” Fall said.

“And that is what we think the Basketball Africa League is going to allow us to do in continuing to provide tremendous young talent across the continent to showcase themselves. We need to continue to grow to create an entertainment property for our fans across the Africa region.”