At this point last season, two teams already knew they would be competing in the post-season. But thanks to a change in format and plenty of parity, only one club has clinched its playoff spot as we rumble into the fourth quarter of this campaign. With no Championship Weekend this season, the top four teams in each conference will make the playoffs, with No. 1 facing No. 4 and No. 2 taking on No. 3 in the conference semifinals. The Finals, of course, will be a best-of-three for the first time. The only team to have clinched are the Scarborough Shooting Stars, who hold a five-game lead atop the East. Ottawa still has games remaining against both Montréal and Niagara, meaning no more than two of those three clubs can reach 14 wins. As a result, no three-way tie involving Scarborough is possible, and the Shooting Stars are guaranteed to finish no lower than fourth place in the Eastern Conference and have officially clinched a berth in the 2026 CEBL Playoffs. The Shooting Stars have held steady atop the standings all season on the backs of MVP candidate Myles Powell and dominant Canadian big man Frank Mitchell, and they’ll welcome a reeling Edmonton Stingers squad to town on Thursday. At 14-3, Scarborough already has its status as East favourite essentially locked up. The rest of the East is very much up for grabs, and could be determined by a home-and-home between the Brampton Honey Badgers and River Lions on Tuesday and Thursday. Niagara, which struggled for much of the middle part of the season under new head coach Kimbal Mackenzie, appears to have righted the ship with a pair of wins over Scarborough and the Montreal Alliance, including star Khalil Ahmad’s first Target Score Winner. With much of their championship core intact, the River Lions could be a fearsome playoff opponent if they make the dance. Win both against the Honey Badgers, and both teams will sit at 9-10 with five games to go. Lose both, and the odds get much longer. In between the Ontario rivals in the standings are the Ottawa BlackJacks and Alliance, both at 8-10. Ottawa beat Montreal but lost to Brampton last week, while Montreal beat Brampton but also lost to Niagara. Little separates the two over 18 games, though the BlackJacks seem to be trending higher with three wins in their last five while the Alliance have dropped four of five. The BlackJacks have just one game this week, a measuring-stick contest against the Shooting Stars, while the Alliance will face major West tests in the Vancouver Bandits and Winnipeg Sea Bears. There is a chaotic world in which all four East teams outside of Scarborough end the week with nine wins apiece. The West is a little more straightforward, with the main intrigue coming in the battle for first between those two clubs who will face Ottawa this week. Vancouver, at 11-7, is navigating this stretch with a new coach after Kyle Julius left for China. Institutionally, the Bandits have the structure in place like Niagara to scare any opponent, but their ceiling remains to be seen. The Bandits are difficult to figure out, with two losses to last-place Calgary this month but a 2-1 record otherwise. For now, Canadians Tyrese Samuel and Mychal Mulder are carrying them. The Sea Bears, at 11-6, are a little bit simpler - everything revolves around league-leading scorer Teddy Allen. They do, however, have a wild card in the form of three-time Xavier Moon, whose return has been held up as he awaits FIBA clearance. If and when Moon returns, Winnipeg will have two star guards - but not very much time to figure out how they can co-exist. The Sea Bears also still have two games left against the Bandits, including a potentially juicy season finale. After those two clubs, Saskatoon (7-9) and Edmonton (7-10) sit third and fourth, while Calgary (4-13) has given itself life with a three-game winning streak. The Stingers, meanwhile, have lost three straight. What once seemed like a given that the Surge would miss the post-season is no longer so. Calgary will host Winnipeg and Saskatoon this week, with their latest run powered by new head coach Dave DeAveiro. The Surge’s first half left essentially no margin for error, but few players yearn for that CEBL title as much as all-time Canadian leading scorer and Surge star Rugzy Miller-Moore. Don’t count them out just yet. Helping their cause are the backsliding Stingers, whose losses to Winnipeg and Vancouver could be excused except for the fact those are the teams the Surge beat in their streak. Veteran captain Nick Hornsby knows what it takes to be successful down the stretch of a CEBL season; he’ll have to use that as Edmonton looks to avoid what would be an epic collapse. Safe to say, intrigue abounds in every game left on the CEBL calendar. The playoffs, after all, are right around the corner. Weekly schedule (Nine games) Game #87 – Tuesday, July 14 – NRL at BHB – 12:30 p.m. ET – CAA Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #88 – Wednesday, July 15 – WPG at SSK – 7:30 p.m. CST / 8:30 p.m. CDT / 9:30 p.m. ET – Merlis Belsher Place (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #89 – Thursday, July 16 – BHB at NRL – 7 p.m. ET – Meridian Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #90 – Thursday, July 16 – EDM at SSS – 7:30 p.m. ET / 5:30 p.m. MT – Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #91 – Friday, July 17 – WPG at CGY – 7:30 p.m. MT / 8:30 p.m. CDT / 9:30 p.m. ET – WinSport Event Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #92 – Friday, July 17 – MTL at VAN – 7 p.m. PT / 10 p.m. ET – Envision Financial Court at Langley Events Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #93 – Saturday, July 18 – EDM at NRL – 3:30 p.m. ET / 1:30 p.m. MT – Meridian Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #94 – Saturday, July 18 – OTT at SSS – 7 p.m. ET – Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #95 – Sunday, July 19 – MTL at WPG – 3 p.m. CDT / 4 p.m. ET – Canada Life Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) Game #96 – Sunday, July 19 – SSK at CGY – 4 p.m. MT/CST / 6 p.m. ET – WinSport Event Centre (CBC Gem, YouTube, CEBL+) For the full 2026 CEBL schedule, please visit cebl.ca/games .