What is the NBA in-season tournament? Format, schedule, groups - ESPN

The NBA announced Tuesday its schedule for the group stage games of its inaugural in-season tournament, which will see the NBA Cup handed out for the first time in Las Vegas on Dec. 9 on ESPN.

The new tournament will be a proving ground for the league's newest star, as Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs have more nationally televised games (three) than any other team during the four-game group stage of the tournament, which will take place across the month of November.

So what, exactly, is the NBA Cup? How will the tournament work? Why is it happening? What is the NBA hoping to get out of it?

With those questions in mind, here's what we know, and don't know, about the NBA's in-season tournament:

NBA commissioner Adam Silver has wanted to implement it for years, for a variety of reasons. Much like the play-in games, though, it took a long time for him to convince everyone involved to give it a shot.

The first hope, obviously, is that it generates revenue. The NBA believes the in-season tournament can become a significant moneymaking franchise over time because of the ability to sell its television rights — as it did with the WNBA's version of the event. The other hope is to draw more eyeballs to the league. The stretch of time the tournament is set within — from the start of November through the first week of December — might be the most irrelevant part of the NBA schedule. It's after the initial rush of the season starting, and alongside the college football and NFL regular seasons. If this tournament can bring more attention to the sport during its least relevant time of the year, it will be seen as a victory.

Silver has long been fascinated with European soccer, and the basis for the NBA's in-season tournament