2020-08-15 18:35:42

It was started 14 years ago

2020.06.19 11:00

Four teams, one league

No SBL games were played since the start of 2020, and very likely the League will remain hibernated for the rest of the year. In June 2006, the first game of Southorn Basketball Association tipped off at Western Park Sports Centre, which is called Sun Yat Sen Memorial Park Sports Centre now, and the love of basketball is still going on for 14 years.

As a matter of fact, after several months of pandemic, while the NBA is going to resume in July, even in a different format, at a different location, with different views and opinions from different players, the situation of the sports centre in Hong Kong should finally return to normal in the next few weeks. Still, no SBL game is expected to be arranged the rest of the year, at least not in the same format as before. The league should come back in 2021.

Since the beginning of the third millennium, a group of friends and old schoolmates, who have entered another stage of their lives after graduated from their schools and universities or come back from the other side of the world, started to play more often and regularly in indoor courts, either because feeling it’s enough being outplayed by the younger ones in street courts, or just become wealthy enough to enjoy more actions with the protection from sunshine and rain, as well as the desire to play with the air conditioner.

While the term Big Data was not yet very popular to the public, at the time when the first iPhone was not yet released, statistical analysis has already taken an important role studying the performance of teams and players of sports. With some tables and chairs provided by the local sports centres, some paper and pencils, and some people who were players but at least being the 13th person (don’t be late, man!) on the floor or were either really non-players but attended (i.e. WAGs) who can work as statisticians, these guys take stats and created a webpage for even these unorganized, casual games.

In 2006, not long after the website had gathered a lot of numbers to make these ordinary citizens look like basketball stars with, for instance, “scoring average”, this bunch of silly basketball players were (or at least one of them was) itchy for the idea of forming a “League”.

With the main group of these basketball friends who played often together in indoor courts, they thought there should be enough numbers of players to set up four teams, a number that would not make the league’s scale too small or too silly to be called “a league.”

Three teams were formed with a majority of their players coming from the same school, and they are called SOUTHORN Tigers, SAMURAI and M.I.B. while a fourth team was born together, which is called G.T. Explorers, formed basically by colleagues working in the same company. This four-team structure has given birth to the Southorn Basketball Association.

About SBABenny WongEddie SzeEdward FongEric LeungG.T. ExplorersGilbert FuKen LeungM.I.B.Patrick TseSAMURAISOUTHORN TigersWestern Park Sports Centre