| In the interest of speed and timeliness, this story is fed directly from the Associated Press newswire and may contain spelling or grammatical errors. |
Long Beach to get ABA team
Thursday June 19, 2003LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) An American Basketball Association team will begin play at Long Beach State's Pyramid in November, team president Steve Chase announced Thursday.
The team will be owned by Hiromu Ikeda, a Japanese business executive who also owns Japan's Niigata Albirex basketball team and Albirex Niigata soccer team, Chase said.
The Long Beach team is working on building relationships with Japanese teams to have their top players play for it, while the Long Beach team plans to tour Japan following conclusion of its season in March, Chase said.
A team nickname and coach are expected to be announced within a week, Chase said.
The ABA, which organizers bill as a revival of the league of the same name which played from 1967-76, operated during the 2000-2001 and 2001-2002 seasons before taking the 2002-2003 season off to reorganize.
The league has also awarded franchises to Kansas City, Las Vegas, Trenton, N.J. and two Mexican cities, Guadalajara and Juarez, a league statement said. Additional teams may also be added for this season, the statement said.
A lease to use the Pyramid has been agreed to but not signed, Chase said. An agreement is close to being reached, Pyramid general manager Mark Edrington said.
(