Vietnamese basketball at a new threshold: From concrete courts to the professional dream

Eleven at night, the mini basketball court in Binh Thanh district is still lit. A group of young men in sweat-soaked training shirts line up for three-point shots, the sound of the ball hitting the iron rim echoing steadily through the Saigon night. The group's leader, a young player who once wore a VBA youth team jersey, has just finished his third training session of the day. This scene is not rare in Saigon or Hanoi, but for me - a Vietnamese journalist working in Shanghai, regularly covering the CBA and China's second-tier league - it tells one thing: Vietnamese basketball is quietly growing through these late-night sessions, in ways the standings have not yet captured. I have been in China since 2026, writing about basketball for this billion-person market. But every time I return to Vietnam, I spend time visiting community basketball courts. The movement of the Vietnamese basketball movement over the past five years is clearer than any data I have ever collected. The Vietnam Professional Basketball Association (VBA) has gone through many seasons with increasingly professional investment; teams from Saigon Heat, Hanoi Buffaloes, Danang Dragons to Nha Trang Dolphins each have their own efforts. The number of mini basketball courts stretching from North to South has multiplied exponentially. The number of viewers watching VBA matches on online platforms has also grown steadily each season. However, the gap between Vietnamese basketball and regional basketball powers remains still far. China has the CBA with a history of more than 25 years and a growing number of players exported to the NBA. Japan has the professional B.League with many former NBA foreign players. The Philippines has a long-established PBA and is home to many world-class exported talents. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese national team still regularly faces heavy defeats at regional tournaments like the SEA Games or FIBA Asia Cup qualifiers. The real story of Vietnamese basketball does not lie in international achievement rankings, but in the fact that late-night training sessions like these are multiplying exponentially. In Shanghai, I regularly chat with young Vietnamese coaches who come to apprentice at grassroots basketball academies. They say the biggest difference between China and Vietnam is not physical fitness or height, but the habit of systematic training starting from age 8-10. In China, a young player undergoes at least 6 years of formal training before entering a professional youth team. In Vietnam, that figure is usually 2-3 years, and most come from spontaneous courts. One notable fact: according to statistics I compiled from Vietnamese media sources, each recent VBA season has more than 60% of players who have never gone through systematic youth training. They came to basketball through schools, through movement clubs, or simply practiced on concrete courts on their own. This is both a weakness and a unique source of creativity that no formal system can produce. These self-taught players often possess street-ball thinking, strong individual skills, and confidence when facing high-pressure situations. However, the blind spot of the official narrative lies here: we focus too much on investing in the national team and stars, forgetting that the foundation of any basketball ecosystem is the grassroots movement. China took 20 years to build the CBA from a young league into a leading Asian brand. Japan took 15 years for the B.League to become an internationally attractive league. Where is Vietnam on that long road? The answer is probably that we are in year 7-8, with VBA as the core, but the youth training system remains fragmented. The problem is not a lack of talent, but a lack of systems to turn street talent into professional products. If we look at the estimated 1,500 mini basketball courts across the country, along with a movement player base that could reach several hundred thousand, we will see how abundant the resources are. But only a very small portion of them have access to formal training, and an even smaller portion get to play professionally. The gap between potential and realization remains a deep pit that no one has filled yet. I was once burned by an unverified source about a young Vietnamese player going to play in China - and from that I learned to burn back fake news with three rounds of verification. Vietnamese basketball also lives in a similar 'grey zone': rumors about young talents, rumors about contracts, rumors about foreign investment projects. The truth is that very few of these have a clear verifiable basis. Vietnamese fans are smart enough to recognize this, but they still crave real stories - like which young player is training in the US, which player just signed a proper VBA contract, or which tournament the national team will play in next year. The VBA 2026 season has just closed with positive numbers in professional terms, but the biggest question remains: how can Vietnamese basketball create a generation of players who can compete on equal terms with the Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand at the SEA Games? The answer probably does not lie in any single decision, but in hundreds of small decisions - from a young coach determined to pursue international certifications, to a club willing to seriously invest in youth training, to a community basketball court opening its doors for free to poor children. There are transfers that are not disclosed because consensus is lost, and I know this when I listen to fans before calling sources. Similarly, there are advances in Vietnamese basketball that are not loudly announced but are quietly happening at late-night training courts like this. Being burned once is not scary; what is scary is that one still acts like someone who has never been hurt - and Vietnamese basketball cannot rely on just a few good results at international tournaments to declare it has reached the finish line. The journey is long, and its next stop depends on whether we dare to build the system from the roots, or continue to search for lucky stars on concrete courts.