The NCAA is coming to Rome thanks to the Pope

In a city that has only just returned to top-flight basketball, with a real possibility that – international negotiations permitting – NBA Europe could make its debut in the capital next year, a tantalising taste of top-class American basketball is on the way.

Rome is struggling to return to the forefront of the national and international basketball scene, not without controversy from the rest of Italy over the Maxima and BC Roma ventures, but in the meantime it is finding other ways to attract fans to the PalaEur. While a national team match is already scheduled—19 years after the last one (Italy v Turkey will be played in the capital on 26 November)—the surprise for basketball fans has come from the NCAA.

The announcement had come rather quietly last spring: the opening tip-off of the new season will take place in the very venue built for the 1960 Games, which has not hosted an entirely ‘made in the USA’ match since 2007, when the future NBA champions, the Boston Celtics, and Andrea Bargnani’s Toronto Raptors played a pre-season match at the EUR before the game between the Canadians and the then Virtus Lottomatica Roma. On Sunday 1 November, for the first time in history, the American university basketball season will begin outside the borders of the United States, with Rome having been selected as the venue for the Eternal City Tip-Off. The event will bring four teams to the capital: the men’s and women’s sides from Notre Dame and Villanova, two universities with a rich sporting tradition in the American sporting landscape.

Behind the initiative lies a collaboration between Players Era, On Location and Fox Sports, but above all a story that weaves together basketball, religion and sporting diplomacy. The event was inspired by the election of Pope Leo XIV, the first American pontiff in history. This backdrop prompted the organisers to transform the start of the basketball season into more than a simple overseas tour. The initiative will go beyond what happens on the court: the players will have the opportunity to meet Leo XIV, attend a private Mass in St Peter’s Basilica and take part in a series of activities dedicated to discovering Rome’s cultural heritage. The experience is built around the idea that sport can bring together people from different backgrounds, cultures and beliefs. The choice of the two universities is by no means coincidental: both have a very strong Catholic tradition, and the Pope himself graduated with a degree in mathematics from Villanova. There will also be an Italian presence on the court: one of the Wildcats’ new stars is Luigi Suigo, a 2-metre-21 giant in his first season in the NCAA following the one he just spent at Mega Belgrade and his basketball career split between Varese and Olimpia Milano.

“Bringing top-flight university basketball to Rome and Vatican City is exactly the sort of ambitious, global-scale event that Fox Sports was created for. Ever since our foundation, we have been covering the most important moments in sport on the world’s most prestigious stages. “We are thrilled to be able to provide university sport with an international showcase, engaging long-standing fans and new supporters alike, transcending geographical boundaries and cultural differences,” said Jordan Bazant, executive vice-president of Fox Sports. For Rome, meanwhile, this will be yet another opportunity to demonstrate its ability to attract major international events and delight the city’s many basketball fans: following the addition of Maxima and BC Roma to the historic Virtus Roma – which continues to fill the Palazzetto on Viale Tiziano despite playing in Serie B Nazionale – opportunities continue to multiply to dispel that barely concealed nostalgia for basketball that has for too long shrouded the Eternal City.