NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� The G League Ignite will not play after this season.
The league made the announcement Thursday, saying it was shutting down the Henderson, Nevada-based Ignite because of 鈥渢he changing basketball landscape, including the NCAA鈥檚 Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) policy and the advent of collectives and the transfer portal鈥� as its primary reasons.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver suggested this could happen last month at the All-Star Game, saying then that the league was 鈥渞eassessing鈥� the Ignite program. It was started by the NBA to give players who aren鈥檛 yet eligible for the draft 鈥� but who didn鈥檛 want to go to college 鈥� a chance to essentially play professional basketball and prepare for the draft as part of a developmental but still competitive program.
鈥淔our years ago, we started Ignite to fill a void in the basketball landscape, and I鈥檓 proud of the contributions we were able to make to that ecosystem,鈥� G League President Shareef Abdur-Rahim said. 鈥淲ith the changing environment across youth and collegiate basketball, now is the right time to take this step."
The changes in college basketball, particularly those allowing athletes to cash in through NIL deals, made the college experience more attractive to the types of players that the Ignite originally targeted.
鈥淪ome of those same players that didn鈥檛 want to be one-and-done players because they felt it was unfair and they wanted the ability to not just earn a living playing basketball but to do commercial deals that weren鈥檛 available to them in college 鈥� now all those same abilities have become available to them," Silver said last month.
This season's Ignite roster has projected top NBA Draft picks Matas Buzelis and Ron Holland. There are nine Ignite veterans currently on NBA rosters, including Scoot Henderson, Jalen Green, Dyson Daniels and Jonathan Kuminga.
The Ignite will play its final game on March 28 against the Ontario Clippers.
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