page_title: Professional sports in Canada
section_title: Basketball
hierarchical_section_title: Professional sports in Canada / Basketball
context_page_description: There are professional teams based in Canada in several professional sports leagues. The National Hockey League currently has seven Canadian franchises and is the most popular professional sports league in Canada. The second most popular sports league in Canada is the Canadian Football League. Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and Major League Soccer are also popular in Canada, more so in Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia than the rest of the country.
context_section_description: The National Basketball Association (NBA) recognizes its first ever game as being a contest between the New York Knickerbockers and Toronto Huskies at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens on November 1, 1946.
  The NBA expanded into Canada in 1995 with the addition of the Toronto Raptors and Vancouver Grizzlies. The Grizzlies moved to Memphis, Tennessee in 2001, but the Raptors continue to draw healthy crowds at Scotiabank Arena. The 2005 and 2006 NBA MVP, Steve Nash, is from British Columbia and has played in international competitions for Canada's national team. On June 13, 2019, the Toronto Raptors won game 6 against the Golden State Warriors for their first NBA Championship.
  In 2011, the National Basketball League of Canada was established as a new domestic pro-basketball league. As of 2019, the league consists of 8 teams: the Halifax Hurricanes, the Island Storm (based out of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island), the Moncton Magic, the KW Titans (based out of Kitchener, Ontario), the London Lightning, the St. John's Edge, the Sudbury Five, and the Windsor Express.
  In 2015, the NBA D-League expanded into Canada with the addition of the Raptors 905. Based in Mississauga, Ontario, the Raptors 905 play out of the Paramount Fine Foods Centre and serve as a minor league affiliate of the Toronto Raptors. In 2017, Raptors 905 won the NBA D-League championship.
  In 2019, a second domestic pro-basketball league was established in Canada with the Canadian Elite Basketball League (CEBL). The league consists of 7 teams: the Edmonton Stingers, the Fraser Valley Bandits (based out of Abbotsford, British Columbia), the Guelph Nighthawks, the Hamilton Honey Badgers, the Niagara River Lions (based out of St. Catharines, Ontario), the Ottawa Blackjacks, and the Saskatchewan Rattlers (based out of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan).
caption: A packed Scotiabank Arena for a Toronto Raptors game against the Milwaukee Bucks
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