Thursday, December 23, 2010

Taiwan basketball league to open 2010-11 season

Taipei, Dec. 23 (CNA) Taiwan's semi-professional basketball league will open its new season Saturday in suburban Taipei, with defending champion Yulon Luxgen eyeing its fifth title in the team's history.

Yulon is scheduled to meet Dacin Tigers Dec. 25 in a rematch of last season's final to unveil the 2010-11 season of the Super Basketball League (SBL), Taiwan's top basketball competition.

Perennial powerhouse Yulon, which won three straight titles from 2003-2006, defeated Dacin four games to two in the best-of-seven SBL Finals in May to win its fourth crown.

However, the team lost its starting point guard Lee Hsueh-lin, who signed with the Chinese Basketball Association's (CBA's) Beijing, and it is in jeopardy of losing its starting center Tseng Wen-ting, whose contract will expire Jan. 15.

Tseng is also contemplating playing in China and is still negotiating a contract extension with Yulon.

A total of 105 regular season games will be played from Dec. 25, 2010 to March 20, 2011 in four venues around the country, including Sinjhuang Stadium in Xinbei City, Yilan University Gymnasium in the eastern city of Yilan, Taipei Gymnasium in downtown Taipei City and Fengshan Gymnasium in Fengshan in southern Taiwan's Kaohsiung City.

Every team will play a 30-game regular season, meeting each of their six opponents five times, according to the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA), governing body of the seven-team SBL, which was established in 2003.

The top four teams will advance to the playoffs, which are scheduled to be played from March 23 to April 17. The first round playoffs and the finals will both adopt the best-of-seven format.

One imported player is allowed for every team. The import registration deadline is Feb. 12, which means that teams are free to change their imports up until that day. (By Chris Wang) ENDITEM/J