According to Ausplay, in 2024 1,056,012 Australian adults play basketball making it the second highest team participation sport in the country.

From the mid-2010s, the sport saw renewed interest following a record number of Australians playing in the National Basketball Association (NBA) in the United States.

The paper reported on Wednesday 17 February 1897 that the following Tuesday at the opening of Our Boys Institute, said to be the largest gymnasium in the colonies, OBI would play YMCA in the first exhibition of basketball in South Australia.

The game occurred six years after the invention of the sport on 21 December 1891 by Canadian James Naismith, a physical education professor and instructor at the International Young Men's Christian Association Training School (YMCA) in Springfield, Massachusetts.

"[2] During the 2000s, interest in the NBL dwindled, with many teams folding, audience attendance fluctuating, and the league's TV presence inconsistent.

[5] The majority of players on the roster for the Australia men's national basketball team (nicknamed the "Boomers") currently play in the NBA.