Home »
Misc »
How many countries is basketball played in
How many countries is basketball played in
How Many People In The World Play Basketball? – Basketball Word!
Basketball is played by millions of people around the world and it is considered the fastest-growing sport with its popularity rising each year globally.
How many people in the world play basketball? FIBA states that at least 450 million people worldwide are playing basketball today. There are 213 countries that have professional basketball leagues and national teams and is one of the fastest-growing sports in the world. It is also estimated that China has over 300 million Chinese people playing the sport as of right now.
Although these are just estimates, the game of basketball is fairly cheap and easy to get a game going. The popularity of basketball has grown also due to the way the National Basketball Association (NBA) markets its product Internationally.
Quick Fact: F.I.B.A stands for Fédération Internationale de Basketball
If you are interested in checking out the best basketball equipment and accessories then you can find them by Clicking Here! The link will take you to Amazon.![]()
com
Why basketball is so popular?
Basketball is one of the few team sports that you can watch then get off your butt, head over to the court where people are playing, and join in. People young and old take up playing basketball because its fun, challenging and you get a great workout without even realizing it. You don’t need any special equipment or a certain amount of players to get a game going. There are so many games you can play and even create. From 1 on 1 to five on five there’s always a game ready to be played. You can even go to a hoop and play by yourself. Yeah, I know maybe not as much fun as with some friends but try creating some games on your own if there’s no one to play with. Need some ideas click here for basketball games you can play on your own.
The game of basketball is an easy game to learn the rules but difficult to play, that’s the challenge for us all. But the game is nothing short of exciting, as you can be right in the action immediately.
The best part about basketball is that you can learn to play while having fun, the health benefits are great to get you in shape and lose a couple of extra pounds while you play without even realizing it. For every hour of play, you can burn anywhere from 200 to 800 calories depending on how hard you work your body. It’s an excellent way to meet new people when you are on a basketball team with four other players. I can’t tell you how many people I met through the game of basketball.
But what exactly makes the sports so popular as it’s a difficult sport to excel at and play?
Growing up I love the game of basketball, as kids, we would shoot the ball at anything a street sign, a garbage bin, it didn’t matter we just love to play the game. I couldn’t afford to play any sport that involved a lot of money. Basketball was the cheapest sport for me to play, it was free all you needed was a basketball. We had basketball hoops and courts everywhere. My friends also had back yard hoops, the adjustable kind that I would go play on all the time and do all sorts of dunks on.
Going to a park and getting a game going was relatively easy.
My love for the game grew further watching the NBA in an era where Michael Jordan was dominating his competition and winning title after title. As kids, we would replicate his moves whether it be dunks, fadeaways, or impossible layups, that was the fun of it. We would have games where I was Jordan and my friend was Charles Barkley and vice versa. Usually, you would do the moves that the player you were mimicking was known for.
The NBA is very smart and how they promote their product. They are constantly finding ways to entertain and create new fan bases in different countries. Especially to young kids, the Superstar players in the N.B.A. alone are some of the most popular athletes in the world. This alone attracts spectators to the sport and these players are celebrities by default. Every kid wants their shoe and every kid wants to be them.
The Growing of International stars in the NBA
According to the N.
B.A., there are 108 international players from 38 countries and territories. While there are 450 players in the N.B.A across all teams in the league, International players account for just over 25 percent. That is remarkable in which at a time most of the NBA thought scouts were wasting their time overseas or across the border searching for International talent. This is just not the case anymore. Click here for the list of International Players that play in the N.B.A. and you will be taken to the N.B.A. website.
This has me thinking about what one player can do to change a country’s interest in the game if he becomes successful and makes it into the league. Because now that player’s home country has a reason to follow their the game and track these players moves hoping he has success. This gets more people interested even kids, this player is a role model.
Making it into the NBA is an Impossible Dream just based on statistics alone, it’s 3 in 10000 chance or 0.03 %. That’s 10000 really good players I would imagine.
The odds of making the N.B.A from overseas is even greater, if you are not playing Division 1 basketball you must dominate the professional league as someone who is very young or at least someone who shows promise. Scouts are constantly looking for the next Greek freak and they will go far and wide to find him. Are you him?
Will the N.B.A have an International team in the league?
There have been rumors for years that the NBA was going to add a foreign team to the league. But it was quite obvious that traveling would be an issue for players and teams especially for the foreign teams as most of the games away would be in the United States. It would have to make sense to have stretches of games away overseas and stretches of games at home in the U.S. Either way the solution would be difficult to make simple with the schedule of an 82-game season.
Quick Fact: The NBA has been playing exhibition games in Europe since 1978.
But if they somehow could make this work it would be the reason for many new fans to watch the N.
B.A. and alongside with and more kids would picking up the game of basketball to play.
In Canada, we have one team the Toronto Raptors and every province in Canada is cheering for them to win the championship every year. 38 million people 10 different provinces cheering for the Raptors, now if this was hockey it’s a completely different story. I could imagine that if you had one European team it would be the same as many of the other countries would cheer their European friends on.
Yao Ming Effect
Yao Ming is a classic example of a successful basketball player that stood at seven-foot five inches tall, all the way from the other side of the world, China. He became the first Chinese basketball player to make the NBA. Soon followed was a huge market for the NBA. Yao Ming had the whole country of china on his back of almost 1.4 billion following his every move. Do you know how many jerseys he probably sold?
Yao Ming played for the Houston Rockets, while every basketball game Houston played it was broadcasted on tv in China.
Although it would be early in the morning because of the different time zones. Yao was actually really good and Houston was making the playoffs almost every year, how they did is another story.
The success of Yao Ming has the NBA forming and funding academies in China and in India, you could probably guess that the reason for this is the number of people that reside in China and India. If they could just get a drop of the market in India it’s big money. These academies are where the best players in those countries play, train, go to school and live basketball.
You could imagine what the NBA is trying to do, billions of people in China and India if they can just get another player to be good enough to make it to the NBA you get the Yao Ming effect. China already loves the game. But India is still far behind they have their cricket and soccer which makes it two of the most popular sports in the world.
If the NBA can find that one player in India to uplift the country, it will spark a trend of one of their own playing basketball at the highest level.
The NBA would love to capitalize on this as it did with Yao Ming.
India almost had their man but he fell short in 2016, but he was a 7’2 basketball player named Satnam Singh who almost fulfilled a dream. You can check out this documentary on Netflix called “One In A Billion”. The issue with the academy that he was in is they don’t always have the best coaches and we are talking about coaches that have coached at a high level. A Coach that knows what it takes to get to the pros. While also playing someone his own height to gain that experience.
The days are over for just being tall in the NBA, at 7 foot five with little to no skill isn’t going to happen, as players who are over 7 feet seem to be able to dribble and shoot better than the smaller guards in today’s N.B.A.
Related Articles:
- Can basketball make you taller?
- 7 tips to playing basketball outside?
- 10 Must have basketball accessories
How Many Countries Play Basketball? (The Truth)
The NBA is, at its heart, an American league.
However, basketball is far from an American-only sport. While it started in the states, the game has spread to many, many countries across the globe. And it only continues to gain popularity with each and every passing year.
There are many places that enjoy basketball in a range of different ways. Here, I will cover how many countries have a close relationship with the game, as well as if those places have any official leagues, or if they see it as a much more casual affair.
Quick Navigation
Basketball, All Over the World
There are currently 197 countries in the world. Nearly all of them play basketball in one way or another.
While that may be surprising to some, the sport is currently ranked as the seventh most popular on Earth. That’s due to a global following of almost a billion people.
With numbers that high, it’s easy to see why so many countries love playing the game. Even so, it doesn’t have the same amount of popularity in every country.
In some places, like the U.S. and Europe, there are official leagues. In others, it’s only played recreationally.
In terms of global popularity, no country enjoys basketball more than the United States. They are then followed by the Philippines, Australia, Canada, Iraq, and Mongolia.
That does not come from the sheer number of players, but from how much that populace engages with the sport.
If a country searches for it online or watches games, they go up in ranking. If they do less, even if more people play casually, they go down.
FIBA and Beyond
When it comes to gauging basketball’s influence worldwide, the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) is a good place to start. The organization hosts the FIBA World Cup, which takes in 56 different countries from all over the world.
That alone suggests basketball is a worldwide phenomenon. In fact, just about every person from every corner of the globe knows about it in one way or another.
Many nations that don’t even know about FIBA still have strong ties to the sport.
Other Leagues
Looking beyond FIBA, it’s important to note that over 100 countries have their own basketball leagues as well. There are many smaller ones out there, suggesting a presence in those nations, and some of the larger ones are slowly gaining more followers.
While the NBA continues to reign supreme in terms of popularity, other major sports organizations are the Euroleague, Chinese Basketball Association (CBA), and the National Basketball League (NBL).
The EuroLeague currently has 18 teams, the CBA has 20, while the NBL has 38. Not only that, but each of those leagues either has or constantly flirts with top NBA talent. There are plenty of excellent foreign players, and almost all of them came out of or played in, the other leagues.
A Rise in Popularity
Regardless of how you look at it, basketball’s popularity is growing.
Not just in the U.S., where it pulls in more and more viewers each year, but across the entire globe. You can’t escape the game these days, and that’s a good thing for fans of the sport.
While in the past you had to be based in the U.S. to watch it on TV, it’s not accessible everywhere on Earth. You can watch the NBA online, or you can tune into other leagues from around the world.
Final Words
As a game, basketball has come a long way over the last 100 years. What was once a much more casual recreational activity steadily grew into a worldwide phenomenon. It’s played in just about every country on Earth, with many larger ones having high-stakes, competitive leagues.
While it’s easy to assume the big countries are the only ones that enjoy throwing a ball through a hoop, the statistics show that’s a love shared by just about every single nation.
How long is a basketball quarter in China and other countries?
Basketball is very popular in the world, it occupies a leading position among sports team games.
They are interested not only in those who play at the amateur and professional level. The rules and subtleties of the gameplay should be known to fans, as well as those who bet on games. In this article we will consider one of these subtleties - the duration of the quarter. You will find out how long a quarter lasts in basketball in China and other countries, what determines the duration of this period, who determines it. The organization of basketball matches in different countries is different, although almost the same rules work.
The rules of basketball are dictated to the whole world by the United States, the NBA was created in this state. This is the strongest basketball league on the planet. But even in America, not everyone knows that in other countries they play a little differently. Not all basketball fans can accurately answer how long a quarter is in Chinese basketball.
What is a quarter?
Any basketball game is divided into four quarters and two halves, consisting of two such intervals.
A quarter is not a period or a set, it is a separate unit of measure. The duration varies and is regulated by the national federation organizing the matches.
If the competition takes place in Europe, then the quarter lasts 10 minutes, in America - 12 minutes. A period is half a game, so in the European league it lasts 20 minutes, in the NBA it lasts 24. A period is not always half a game. In hockey, where the term comes from, a period lasts 20 minutes, which is one third of the entire match. The term set refers to 12 minutes of playing time, it is used in tennis and volleyball, it is not used in basketball. Each discipline has its own peculiarities of timing.
How do you count time in basketball?
The match begins with the main referee throwing the ball into the center of the court. A struggle begins for him, in which a player from each team enters. Time starts counting from the starting face-off.
Although a quarter is defined as 10 and 12 minutes, it actually lasts longer.
Time is counted only in those moments when the players hold the ball in their hands or dribble it. Each basketball hall has a scoreboard that counts the game time and shows it to everyone present.
Basketball in Asia
Let's move on to answering an interesting question regarding the quarter in basketball in China, how many minutes does it last. The phrase “Asian basketball” itself seems strange to many Europeans. They imagine the basketball player is very tall, which is not typical for representatives of Asian nationalities. Those who have never watched KBA matches and have no idea what short Chinese basketball players are capable of are subject to such a delusion. There are many legends among them who possess dribbling and know how to masterfully do slam dunks.
The organization differs from the European one, including the duration of the quarters. They are 12 minutes, which is equivalent to the NBA. There are other features in Chinese games. In the Celestial Empire, this sport is very much loved, although it is forbidden to make sports bets, but there are a lot of bets on basketball.
Experts estimate that the KBA is now in its heyday, the organization is cultivating a new generation of professional athletes who will excel in the Asian league. They also have legionnaires of a different level, but there are relatively few of them. The system of Chinese basketball is distinguished by its isolation, but if you wish, you can still understand it.
Basketball quarter in other countries
Having found out how much a basketball quarter is in China, it is worth asking other countries as well. It all depends on which organization the match is under the auspices of. If it is FIBA, then the match will consist of four ten-minutes. If the NBA - then four segments of 12 minutes, a total of 48 minutes.
It is believed that the US added an extra two minutes in order to give sponsors more advertising time. The longer the viewer spends time at the screen and sees ads, the more money the NBA will earn from it.
This opinion may well be true, since the NBA is not only the most professional, but also the richest basketball organization on the planet.
The total duration of matches is also different. It includes not only game intervals, but also breaks between them, as well as pauses when time stops. The clock stops in situations that are called dead ball. These are free throws, fouls and other circumstances. On average, one game takes 2-3 hours.
According to NBA statistics, regular season games average 137 minutes. Accordingly, FIBA games should be eight minutes shorter, but there are other defining features. For example, there are fewer timeouts in the European league. If NBA basketball players get 12 time-outs per meeting, and they are mandatory, then FIBA gives five, and they can not be used.
Knowing how long a quarter lasts in basketball in China, the US and Europe, as well as other interesting features, watching the matches of different leagues becomes more exciting.
Basketball for children - what is useful, at what age to play
Basketball is one of the most popular sports games.
Basketball for children is considered one of the early sports, because kids can be enrolled in the first lessons from the age of 3. But the most important advantage of basketball is its accessibility.
Sections for children are available in schools and neighborhood clubs, and classes are often free. And if you are not ready to give the child to the section, just buy him a ring and a ball and hang it on your site and the kid will already be busy in sports, which means he will get the maximum benefit for development.
Benefits of basketball for children, what qualities it develops
Before sending a child to a section, parents should know how basketball is useful for children and what qualities it develops.
First of all, like any team sport, basketball develops social skills. Working in a team, children learn to help each other, care about common interests and work for the good of the team.
Moreover, this basketball is an excellent emotional release.
It helps the guys throw out negative energy and get positive emotions. Along with this, character is tempered during classes, and the child learns to go towards the goal, sacrificing his own desires and needs.
Basketball also helps to get rid of complexes. This is especially true for tall girls who are noticeably taller than their peers. In a team where all players are taller than average, the girls no longer feel like a black sheep, but gain self-confidence and begin to be proud of their height.
The influence of playing basketball on the physical development of a child
The influence of playing basketball on the physical development of a child is also strong. First of all, the guys involved in this sport develop endurance, and all muscle groups are strengthened. Basketball practice - these are jumping, running, swinging arms, tilts and squats, which allow you to develop all muscle groups and strengthen the heart and blood vessels.
In addition to the general health benefits, basketball will also help prevent the development of certain diseases that result from an inactive lifestyle.
What's more, basketball develops:
- Overview of vision. Due to the fact that the player must constantly keep an eye on the ball and other players, the field of view is improved. Children learn to manage peripheral vision and train their eyes;
- Reaction speed. Often during a match, an athlete must make lightning-fast decisions on which the outcome of the game depends. This helps children learn to respond quickly to emergency situations;
- Mindfulness. Through intense play, attention and memory develop, which not only has a beneficial effect on the playground, but also in studies and everyday life.
Given these facts, the question of what basketball gives a child can be answered that classes will strengthen physical, mental and mental health. That is why basketball is often recommended to children suffering from reduced attention and weak immunity. But not all children can benefit from basketball, you can find out what kind of sport is suitable for a child here.
Does playing basketball make children grow
It is often said that basketball makes children grow, but is it really true? Recent studies have shown that yes, indeed, he can help the baby grow up, but is not able to grow a giant out of him.
The increase in height is due to the straightening of the spine, which is stretched during jumps. Also, a slight increase in growth contributes to the strengthening of the muscles of the back and legs.
But to say that basketball can significantly affect the growth of an athlete is wrong, there is no scientific justification for this.
The fact that in the sections all children are really tall is explained simply - short children simply leave this sport, because they cannot compete with tall athletes, as a result they move on to other sports, for example, volleyball, where they need both tall and undersized athletes.
At what age can a child play basketball
For preschool children, basketball is available from 3 years of age.
Often this game is played in physical education classes in kindergarten. Of course, such a crumb will not be taken to the section, but at this age the child can already be introduced to the ball and the net.
Professional basketball training for children starts at the age of 5-6 years. At this age, you can enroll in a section at the sports palace, both boys and girls are accepted. The first 4-5 years the guys work out together, and only at the age of 10 the coach forms the men's and women's teams.
Basketball for beginners is more about general physical training and familiarity with the ball. In the first years of training, the coach pays special attention to the development of endurance, so most of the training takes place in the fresh air.
In the gym, the guys learn different techniques and combinations, and also learn how to hit the basket. According to statistics, it is in their youth that children are more likely to encounter injuries in basketball. This is due to not yet developed coordination and lack of skills in programming movements.
That is why sports insurance for basketball at this age is a necessity, because it will reimburse the costs of treatment and provide the young athlete with high-quality rehabilitation, which will prevent the occurrence of fatigue injuries and chronic injuries in the future.
Age characteristics of children in basketball
Age characteristics of children in basketball are a fundamental factor in drawing up a schedule and training plan.
Consider how the load of basketball players changes with age:
- 3-5 years. At this age, kids still do not know how to memorize the rules of the game and listen to the coach. All classes are held in a playful way and are aimed at developing coordination of movements and mindfulness;
- 5-7 years old. During this period, special attention is paid to the physical development and increasing the flexibility of the child. The goal of the trainer is to maximize endurance and strengthen all muscle groups. Also at this stage, children begin to learn the rules of basketball and learn various tactical and dynamic techniques;
- 7-9 years old.
This is the age at which real training starts. At the age of 8, children can already participate in competitions. Now all their work is aimed at the result of the whole team. During these years, the main task of the coach is to teach the guys to interact with each other; - 10-12 years old. At this age, men's and women's teams are formed. Now the team is becoming a real family with common goals and objectives. Most often, it is at this age that the first victories occur;
- 12-14 years old. At this age, children learn to program their movements. This is a very important stage for every basketball player, because the final result of the maneuver depends on it. At this time, the main task of the coach is to hone the movements of each player to the ideal;
- 14-16 years old. This is the time to master tactical thinking. The brain of a teenager is already ready to solve tactical problems and make quick decisions. At this moment, the coach already sees which of the guys can become a real champion;
- 16-18 years old.
This is the age when a teenager must show all the acquired skills. Strong players are formed into teams to participate in important competitions. At this time, the start in a sports career begins, because the guys already have sports categories and can participate in adult competitions.
If you want to grow a real champion out of a child, a section at a school or a sports palace is a good place to start. Later, by the age of 7, the basketball section for children should be focused specifically on professional activities. Such a section can be found in any city, because this sport is very popular. You can choose a section closer to home in our catalog of sports schools and sections.
Basketball is one of the sports for children, which has a minimum of contraindications and a maximum of benefits. Classes on the playground and in the gym can be the best hobby for a child, because during the game the guys learn true friendship. Moreover, basketball for children will also help parents in raising a teenager, because the child will grow up in a healthy company and he simply will not have time for nonsense.
