BAL season to feature record six new teams

The Basketball Africa League (BAL) on Friday announced the 12 teams and the game schedule for the opening leg of the league’s milestone fifth season, which will tip off with the Kalahari Conference group phase from Saturday, April 5 to Sunday, April 13 at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Sports Complex in Rabat, Morocco.

The 2025 BAL season, which will feature three regular-season group phases and culminate with the playoffs and finals at the SunBet Arena in Pretoria, SA in June, will feature a record six first-time BAL participants.

This includes the first BAL teams from Cape Verde (Kriol Star Basketball) and Kenya (Nairobi City Thunder), as well as defending champion Petro de Luanda (Angola) and 2022 champion US Monastir (Tunisia).

Petro de Luanda and US Monastir are the only teams to have qualified for all five BAL seasons. 

Each conference will play a 12-game group phase during which each team will face the other three teams in its conference twice. 

During group phase play, the home team in each country will play on every game day.

In the season opener, Stade Malien (Mali) will face Rivers Hoopers (Nigeria) at 5pm. In the second game, home team Fath Union Sport (FUS; Morocco) will take on Al Ittihad (Egypt) at 8pm.

Single-game tickets for the games in Rabat are available online at Guichet.ma.

Fans who purchase tickets will also have free access to the BAL Fan Zone at the arena.   

Tickets for the games in Dakar, Senegal are also on sale now at BAL.NBA.com and Bal-teewtickets.com.

Eight teams from across the three conferences will travel to Pretoria for four seeding games followed by an eight-game, single-elimination playoffs and finals from Friday, June 6 to Saturday, June 14. 

Additional information about the season will be announced in the coming weeks.

The three conferences for Rabat are:

Kalahari: Al Ittihad (Egypt)*, Fath Union Sport (FUS; Morocco), Stade Malien (Mali), Rivers Hoopers (Nigeria)

Sahara: ASC Ville de Dakar (Senegal)*; Kriol Star Basketball (Cape Verde)*, Petro de Luanda (Angola), US Monastir (Tunisia)

Nile: Al Ahli Tripoli (Libya)*, Armée Patriotique Rwandaise Basketball (APR; Rwanda), Made by Basketball (MBB; SA)*, Nairobi City Thunder (Kenya)*

*First-time BAL participants — BAL