Jr. NBA Leagues expanding to Orlando to help grow youth sports
To celebrate Jr. NBA Week and the impact of recreational youth sports, the NBA announced it will be expanding the Jr. NBA Leagues to three new cities — Indianapolis, Miami and Orlando.
Launched last November in 10 markets across the United States, Jr. NBA Leagues is a national network of youth basketball leagues for boys and girls ages 6-14. The program works with community-based organizations and engaged with more than 20,000 youths nationwide in its first year.
Now entering its second year, the Jr. NBA Leagues is coming soon to Central Florida to help expand the game of basketball and offer a high-quality recreational sports experience for kids in the area.
Adam Harper, associate vice president of youth basketball development at the NBA, explained why Orlando made sense as a location for expansion.
“Orlando — given its basketball history and geographical location — was an opportunity to step into a market that showed a lot of promise,” he told the Sentinel. “We’re excited to be bringing Jr. NBA Leagues to Orlando.”
The first Jr. NBA League in Orlando will launch in December in Springhill, and additional leagues in the region will start throughout the spring and summer on a rolling basis. Anybody interested in participating in Jr. NBA Leagues can visit www.jrnbaleagues.com.
Although there’s already a strong presence of youth sports in Orlando, Harper explained what makes the Jr. NBA League experience different.
“It brings the fun and excitement of the NBA and WNBA and their teams to the youth basketball experience and we think that will create that elevated experience and growth of the sport,” he said.
By joining a Jr. NBA League, kids get to wear NBA and WNBA officially licensed jerseys, and coaches are provided training, curriculum and resources from the league to help teach the sport.
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While the Magic already have their Jr. Magic youth basketball program, the Jr. NBA League will have a strong relationship with the franchise as well.
“We’re fortunate already that our teams in general — but [specifically] the Magic and their players — share in this commitment to elevating youth basketball,” Harper said. “We work closely with the teams so leagues in those markets will have an opportunity to unique benefits and exclusive experiences to connect for the players and parents with the team.”
The NBA hopes the program highlights the league’s commitment to ensuring that children of all backgrounds have access to a quality youth basketball experience.
Of course, the goal isn’t to find the next LeBron James or Sue Bird. Instead, it’s about helping youth across the country grow through the power of sport.
“It teaches so many different things and puts kids in so many different situations that are really hard to simulate outside of sports,” Harper said. “You get to learn to work within a team, learn new skills, get to gain confidence, be healthy and learn about how that positively impacts your body. You get to learn how to win, lose and deal with adversity. All of these values and skills that are core to sport are helping young people develop as individuals.
“At the end of the day, we’re trying to create access to basketball so that we can, yes, teach them the fundamentals, but it’s really for them to develop as confident young people who are going to be contributors to their local communities, whether that’s in sports or outside of sports.”
Email Jason Beede at jbeede@orlandosentinel.com or follow him on X, known as Twitter, at @therealBeede.
