Kolkata: Here’s some good news for the NBA fans in India. In a first of its kind, there would be a live streaming of regular season game via Facebook live between the Golden State Warriors and the Sacramento Kings on Sunday as per an announcement made by the league on Saturday, reports AFP.
The Sacramento Kings which is owned by Indian born techie-businessman Vivek Ranadive will be hosting their fourth annual Bollywood night around the competition, which would be a celebration of Indian culture, music and cinema. The game will be geologically targeted to their fans and followers in India over the Facebook pages of the NBA, the Sacramento Kings and Golden State Warriors.
The live streaming will feature the NBA Mobile View feed that will deliver optimised images of the game, especially for mobile phones and tablets. The Facebook page of the NBA has over one million from India and it is the first sports program to be streamed on Facebook live.
The NBA is slowly and steadily making its presence felt in India. As per a report on ozy.com, “There are more than half the population is 25 or younger, by going to the grassroots — it has 1.5 million kids in school-based basketball programs in 14 cities this year.
“The league is also focusing on mass media. There will be about 300 regular-season NBA games broadcast live to India this season, and about 70 million viewers in India watched an NBA game at some point last season, according to Yannick Colaco, NBA India’s Mumbai-based managing director. The goal this season: 100 million viewers.”
The report further states, “In fact, there has been only one player of Indian origin to play in a league game in NBA history: 7-foot-5 Sim Bhullar, whose career has totalled three minutes for the Kings at the end of last season. Oh, and he’s actually from Canada.”
The Golden State Warriors have the best NBA record at 31-6 and past ost Valuable players Kevin Durant and perhaps the greatest shooter in the history of the NBA according to many analysts, Stefen Curry. The Sacramento Kings however are 15-21 and are placed ninth in the Western Conference.
(With inputs from AFP)