NBA commissioner: Las Vegas dominates expansion talks this week

NEW YORK —Competition among potential owners and potential arena developers for a Las Vegas expansion NBA team kept Sin City front and center during a meeting of the NBA Board of Governors here this week. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said Tuesday that Las Vegas got more attention than Seattle, the league’s other possible expansion site, because the Emerald City has fewer potential ownership groups and only one arena site. By comparison, Las Vegas has at least four potential ownership groups and even more potential arena sites. But at the same time, there are groups who have presented plans to build what I would call a modern entertainment palace in Las Vegas. And it’s a unique market where you can truly see essentially 365-day-a-year activity.” Should the NBA expand into Las Vegas, the city will have added teams from the four major North American professional sports leagues — MLB, the NBA, the NFL and the NHL — within a decade.

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Scoop News DeskLas Vegas, Nevada · Published Wednesday, September 16, 2026 at 12:41 AM UTCUpdated Wednesday, September 16, 2026 at 8:21 AM UTC

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The importance of that feat to the city can’t be overlooked, according to Steve Hill, president and CEO of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. “It’s a huge step that Las Vegas will have taken really quickly,” Hill told the Review-Journal last week. “I mean, you look back, the Knights took the ice in October of ’17. The next deadline for the bid groups involved in the Las Vegas process is Thursday, Silver said. “These are groups that have already qualified,” Silver told the Review-Journal after the news conference. “There were some groups that fell out after the first round of bidding. “These are now groups that, again, are known to us and are working with our investment banking group, PJT.