{"id":661390,"date":"2026-03-16T17:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T17:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/661390\/"},"modified":"2026-03-16T17:02:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T17:02:15","slug":"how-potential-nba-expansion-would-change-conference-alignment-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/661390\/","title":{"rendered":"How Potential NBA Expansion Would Change Conference Alignment Revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Minnesota Timberwolves or Memphis Grizzlies would be the most likely teams to move to the Eastern Conference if the NBA approves expansion to Seattle<\/a> and Las Vegas, ESPN<\/a>‘s <\/a>Shams Charania<\/a> reported on Monday (March 16).<\/p>\n

“Executives across the NBA expect either the\u00a0Minnesota Timberwolves\u00a0or\u00a0Memphis Grizzlies\u00a0to move to the East to realign conferences with 16 each when Seattle and Las Vegas become West teams,” Charania wrote in an article.<\/p>\n

The NBA<\/a> will reportedly hold a vote at the upcoming Board of Governors meetings on the potential expansion of two teams in Las Vegas and Seattle, with the two franchises targeted to join the league during the 2028-29 season, sources with knowledge of the situation confirmed to Charania on Monday.<\/p>\n

“Just in: The NBA will hold a vote at the Board of Governors meetings March 24-25 to explore adding expansion teams exclusively in Las Vegas and Seattle, with the two franchises targeted for the 2028-29 season, sources tell ESPN. There is momentum for stakeholders to approve surveying what industry executives project will be bids in the $7-to-$10 billion range for each team,” Charania wrote on his X account. “This first vote will allow the league to explore purchase processes for Las Vegas and Seattle. There will then be a potential final vote later in the year to finalize transactions to 32 teams — if bids reach necessary threshold. In both voting rounds, 23 of 30 governors must vote in favor.”<\/p>\n

Seattle has long been pegged for a potential NBA return, having served as the home of the Seattle Supersonics from 1967 to 2008 before the franchise relocated and rebranded as the Oklahoma City Thunder<\/a>, the defending 2025 NBA champions who currently have the best record in the league. Las Vegas has emerged as a major sports city during the past decade, with the NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights launching as an expansion team in 2017, winning the Stanley Cup in just six seasons; the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders moving from Oakland, California in 2020; and MLB’s Athletics, also formerly of Oakland, set to relocate to Las Vegas in 2028<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The NBA last added an expansion team when the then-Charlotte Bobcats were launched in 2004 before the franchise took over the former Hornets moniker previously held by the now-New Orleans Pelicans who moved from Charlotte in 2002 and kept the original name until 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Minnesota Timberwolves or Memphis Grizzlies would be the most likely teams to move to the Eastern Conference…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":661391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3782],"tags":[7,84989,9725,6073,307,152,3954,6,84979,2084,3970,567,1063,308,13068],"class_list":["post-661390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-minnesota-timberwolves","tag-basketball","tag-conference-alignment","tag-expansion","tag-las-vegas","tag-minnesota","tag-minnesota-timberwolves","tag-minnesotatimberwolves","tag-nba","tag-purchase-processes","tag-season","tag-seattle","tag-shams-charania","tag-teams","tag-timberwolves","tag-vote"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116239934903080912","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661390"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661390\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}