Westerville Parks and Recreation opened registration Monday for its Jr. Cavs Bantam Basketball League, inviting boys and girls in grades 3 through 8 to sign up for the 2026-27 season. Every participant will receive an official reversible Jr. Cavs jersey and two Loudville tickets to a select Cleveland Cavaliers home game during the 2026-27 season, according to the announcement.
The league, offered in partnership with the Cleveland Cavaliers, is designed to teach basketball fundamentals while guaranteeing each team seven total games, according to a post from the City Government of Westerville, Ohio. The season includes nine weeks of weekly practice and six regular Saturday games, capped off by a single-elimination tournament. All games and practices take place at the Westerville Community Center, located at 350 N. Cleveland Ave., which houses the multi-purpose gymnasium courts and community athletic spaces used for the city's indoor youth sports offerings, per Westerville Parks and Recreation.
How the League Fits Into a Bigger Statewide Network
The Bantam league is aimed at older elementary and middle school kids, but it isn't the only rung on Westerville's basketball ladder. Children in first and second grades who aren't quite ready for competitive play can start with Pee Wee Basketball, an instructional, non-competitive program focused on fundamentals, the department notes.
Westerville's program is one piece of a much larger regional network built around the Cavaliers brand. The YMCA of Greater Cleveland served as the founding partner of the YMCA Junior Cavs program, helping establish the template for combining municipal recreation divisions and local leagues into a unified affiliate network tied to the NBA franchise, according to the YMCA of Greater Cleveland. That network has grown considerably: Point3, the Cavaliers' youth apparel partner, noted in April 2025 that more than 15,000 youth athletes across Ohio participate annually in Cavs Youth Basketball programs, calling it one of the fastest-growing Jr. NBA affiliations in the league.
Cleveland Clinic Backs a Regional Youth Sports Push
The scale extends beyond Ohio's borders. In April 2025, the Cleveland Cavaliers and Cleveland Clinic announced a 25-year partnership extension naming the health system the umbrella partner across all Cavaliers youth sports initiatives, which collectively reach approximately 58,000 youth annually across Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York, according to a statement carried by NBA.com.
The ticket and gear perks built into Westerville's registration fees follow a structure used elsewhere in the Jr. Cavs network. Under standard municipal agreement terms for the program, local departments purchase discounted game tickets built into participant registration fees, ensuring each player receives two Cleveland Cavaliers home game tickets at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse along with official co-branded gear, according to a 2025 agreement document from the City of Broadview Heights.
Volunteer Coaches Face Background Checks
Westerville also maintains its own oversight measures for the league. Volunteer coaches participating in the Jr. Cavs Bantam Basketball League are required by the city to submit a formal volunteer application and complete a mandatory background check screening before being approved for team placement. To keep competition balanced across age divisions, the department uses mandatory skills evaluations before the season to determine team rosters, and it restricts custom player placement requests.
The league is part of a broader civic operation: Westerville Parks and Recreation delivers nearly 3,000 recreational, educational and leisure programs annually across its parks and Community Center facilities. Westerville itself is a Central Ohio suburb of roughly 38,165 residents located about 10 miles northeast of Columbus, spanning Franklin and Delaware counties, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.
