In a gimmick borrowed from European soccer leagues, the National Basketball Assn. has reportedly set plans for a new In-Season Final Four Tournament.
ESPN reports the league’s schedule addition will be set for Dec. 7 and 9 in Las Vegas. Full details on the competition — including groupings — will be unveiled Saturday night in Las Vegas on ESPN’s “NBA Today,” the league said.
The long-rumored tournament will likely be split into six different pools of five teams. The pools will be created from teams in the same conference.
During the first six weeks of the season, on designated days, teams will play group games — every team in their pool once — with two of them at home and two on the road. That will determine the winner of each pool, which then morphs into a single-elimination format with two wild card teams.
Player statistics will count for the regular season totals, except for the championship game. As incentive, players on the winning team will receive $500,000 each.
The two teams that reach the mid-season championship will play 83 games in the season.