FIBA Secretary General Andreas Zagklis has toured Intuit Dome, the new home of the Los Angeles Clippers and the chosen venue for basketball at the 2028 Summer Olympics. He was impressed, which is a positive sign for the upcoming Games, especially after the record-breaking Paris Olympics. Zagklis expressed his satisfaction at his end-of-Olympics news conference before the women’s gold-medal game between the U.S. and France. He visited the Intuit Dome site while construction was ongoing as part of his role on the International Olympic Committee’s coordination commission for LA 2028. “This is an arena that has been designed for the fans, for the experience of the fans,” Zagklis said. “So, I think, I expect excellent images and top-level experience for our players.”
The Clippers will begin playing at Intuit Dome this upcoming season; the opening game announcement will be made later this week when the NBA releases the schedule for the 2024-25 season. The first event at the $2 billion arena is set for Thursday—a Bruno Mars concert. During the Olympics, the arena will have a generic name as corporate sponsorships are typically not allowed by IOC rules. For example, Accor Arena, the official name of the basketball venue in Paris’ Bercy neighborhood, was called Bercy Arena during the Games.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told the Associated Press earlier this month that the league is intensifying talks with FIBA about how to strengthen its presence in Europe, potentially through an annual tournament or an NBA-operated league. Zagklis confirmed these discussions, highlighting the 35-year partnership between the NBA and FIBA, which continues to grow. “It is natural for us to have discussions on a new project on broadening our cooperation in either new continents or other areas of our sport, recognising that what one does best is commercialising basketball at the very top in the (NBA) and what the other does best — that’s us — is developing the sport across 212 countries,” Zagklis said. “There are, indeed, continuous discussions.”
Silver mentioned that the league doesn’t have specifics yet, and neither does FIBA. “Our vision is to unite and grow,” Zagklis said. “We’ve been trying very hard in Europe to unite the family and grow the sport.”
The NBA first held an exhibition in Europe in 1984 and has been sending teams there regularly for preseason or regular-season games since 1993. San Antonio—featuring French star Victor Wembanyama—will play Indiana in Paris twice in January, marking the first time two NBA teams will play back-to-back regular-season games in Europe against each other.
The Paris Olympics set a record for attendance, helped by the ability to accommodate 27,000 fans at the Lille venue hosting the men’s and women’s tournament group stage. Zagklis said the 1996 Atlanta Games had around 1.068 million fans in 92 games, while the Paris Games will conclude with roughly 1.08 million fans in 52 games. FIBA saw an average attendance of about 22,000 for group-phase games, a significant increase from the average of about 3,000 at Rio de Janeiro in 2016. “The numbers are staggering and show the growth of our sport, both on the men’s and women’s side,” Zagklis said.
He also noted strong ratings and a five-year high for Google searches of “basketball” during the Games. “The engagement has been fantastic,” he said.
The Paris Games were the sixth—and likely the last—for two Olympic basketball legends, Rudy Fernandez from Spain and Diana Taurasi from the U.S. No other Olympian has participated in six basketball tournaments. Zagklis spontaneously praised both players for their remarkable achievement. “They deserve our recognition and admiration,” Zagklis said. “And I’m sure not only their younger teammates in the locker room but many young people in their countries are inspired by the two of them.”
Nigeria’s women became the first African team to reach the quarterfinals of an Olympic tournament, while South Sudan’s men emerged as a standout story of the Games, narrowly missing the knockout stage. This aligns with FIBA’s goal of expanding the game on a global scale. “It was a big first for Africa, one we have been waiting on for quite some time,” Zagklis said.
