THE Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF) has announced that the Nigerian Women Basketball League will dunk off on Thursday, June 1.

The NBBF disclosed this to The ICIR on Tuesday, May 9. The NBBF made the disclosure in response to a report titled, ‘Three years after, Nigeria’s women’s basketball league yet to dunk-off, triggers talent drain‘ published on Tuesday by The ICIR.

The ICIR reported that the suspension of Nigeria’s women’s basketball league has left a sour taste in the mouths of the coaches, players and other stakeholders of the league since it was held last in 2019.

Reacting to the story published by The ICIR, an NBBF official forwarded the poster of the next edition of the women’s basketball league to The ICIR reporter.

In a chat with The ICIR, a member of the NBBF Media team, Maxwell Kumoye, said the Federation has concluded plans to resume the league, adding that the plan was to start the women league after the completion of the ongoing NBBF Division 2 Atlantic Conference in Abuja.

“After the NBBF National Division 2 Atlantic Conference, we will head to the female basketball league,” he said.

He assured the participating teams that “all the necessary logistics have been made available for the effective take-off of the league”.

“We don’t just want to run a league, we want to run a league that will be meaningful,” he added.

The poster sent to The ICIR indicated that the women’s basketball league will start with qualifiers among the teams divided into two groups – Atlantic and Savannah Conference.

The Atlantic Conference, which has 18 teams, is billed to dunk off on June 1 and end on June 11 and it would be held in Benin, Edo State. The Savannah Conference, with 16 teams, is slated to start on June 7 and end on June 17, at Zaria, Kaduna State.

Nigeria’s women’s basketball league is sponsored by Zenith Bank.