NBA commissioner Adam Silver spoke about the NBA’s interest in a European league last week when the NBA staged the 2025 NBA Paris Games. Silver confirmed that the NBA is focused on figuring out how to run a league in Europe. This would not be an expansion of the NBA itself, but a new league that Silver said would operate similarly to the Basketball Africa League.
One side effect of focusing on European expansion is that it has slowed the process on NBA expansion stateside. Silver has said the league is looking at expansion, but has cautioned that adding new teams to the NBA isn’t imminent. With the league’s top executives focused on European expansion, that’s taken the focus off expanding the NBA itself.
Another factor in holding up NBA expansion has been the slow-moving process with the sale of the Boston Celtics. The league, and its owners, are looking for the Celtics sale price to set a baseline marker for what the NBA can look for in expansion fees. Boston is wrapping up the first round of bidding and should be moving forward early in 2025. However, current Celtics ownership has said this process will take time, as they intend to remain involved with the team through the end of this season, possibly into next.