In 2011, the Club Association, which governed the destinies of all professional basketball, in this case League B, at that time the third division, gave the CABB the organization of the category that was renamed the Federal Tournament. With 55 teams, led by Ricardo Siri and Enrique Tolcachier from Chaco, the contest made its debut.
After the intervention of the CABB, a new executive committee arrived in 2014. But the changes would also begin in the Federations. In the region, the famous C League was eliminated and the provincials began to be the step prior to professional competition. Along the way, the numbers of participants varied as well as some rules, promotions, and penalties because the clubs began to feel the blows of the ‘adventure’ and the debts accumulated.
In 2020, the tournament was the last to be interrupted after several twists and turns, very untidy, according to the leaders themselves. The new CABB, under pressure, ended up suspending the season. But, after almost a year without movement, the economy and situation of players, referees, coaches, table officials was urgent and requested a response from the CABB.
In September 2020, the CABB assured that 65 teams were eligible (after meeting financial obligations) to play, but invitations began to arrive much earlier to clubs that were not in the category, some even without ever having played professional basketball. In addition to modifying the setup of the squad, in terms of the ages of the chips, it was decided to join the Development League teams. In addition there will be no descents, no promotion.
So what is this Transition Tournament? The Federal Tournament, The Development League (another tournament that continues to seek its essence and objective, constantly changing), a space for job sources to recover? Yes, all that.
Prior to the confirmation by the CABB that there would be 64 teams that will play the contest, the resignations began, in Capital Federal, in Entre Ríos, in Chaco, in Corrientes, in Santa Fe, in La Pampa, among others. Many leaders argue that the ‘health situation’ remains complex; others that the protocol requested by the organization is an investment that, in the current conditions and playing without an audience, cannot be faced.
Of the 64 teams there is still no official confirmation of several. Eight will be from the Development League and 12 from Buenos Aires (Metropolitan Area). Among those who decided to get off, there are several entertainers from recent seasons. Many decided to rethink the option of returning or playing in October, when the ‘official competition’ begins.
This is the case, for example, of Cultural de Santa Sylvina, which was playing its first season in professional basketball “with a lot of effort”, but said that this proposal was not. “In October we will study it,” said President Javier Ayala.
For young players and coaches from the interior it will be an opportunity to rub shoulders with professionalism. For many that their source of work does not stop, for the clubs, a new adventure.
Basketball is perhaps, with soccer the most federal sport at a professional level, and the pandemic seriously affected the bases: development, the internal basketball of each province, and in the second and third categories the sources of work. El Federal continues to fill one more page of its young and convulsed history, waiting for the new normal to bring it the desired stability and, mainly, the security of its continuity.
