The Big V is one of the largest semi-professional basketball league structures in the world.

It has a unique place in Australian Basketball, being a league wholly owned and operated by its member clubs, but ultimately acknowledging the governance of Basketball Victoria. This combines the strength of membership based decision making with the support and infrastructure of Australia's biggest state basketball association.

The League commenced under the name "The Victorian Women's Conference" in 1987. The men's and women's competitions were run independently until 2000. Until this time the League was known as either the CVIBL (Country Victorian Invitation Basketball League), the VBL (Victorian Basketball League) or WVBL (Women's Victorian Basketball League). In 2004, the member clubs of the League voted to re-brand the entire structure as Big V.

In 2008, Big V Basketball has 108 teams playing across 11 competitions which equates to 1146 games in 41 stadiums across Victoria.  These games comprise both genders, and incorporate four levels of play and two levels of youth league basketball.

The structure is as follows:
Big V State Championship (11 Men's teams and 8 Women's teams)
Big V Division One (10 Men's teams and 9 Women's teams)
Big V Division Two (8 Men's teams and 9 Women's teams)
Big V Division Three (8 Men’s teams and 8 Women’s teams)
Big V Youth League One (12 Men's and 13 Women's teams)
Big V Youth League Two (12 Men’s teams)

The Big V player base will exceed 1800 this year and with Coaches, Referees, Statisticians and Scoretable officials, over 2000 people are involved in games played every weekend.

The highest level of Big V competition is Championship Men & Women, which also serve as the men's and women's conferences of the ACC (Australian Club Championships formerly ABA).

The Big V Championship division is seen as a viable avenue to national league competition. Players such as  David Barlow, Darryl Corletto, Jason Eversteyn, Dallas Jeffree, David Donaldson, Lee Jeka and Sharin Milner have gone on to play in the NBL/WNBL. All of these have graduated directly from Big V to the National Basketball League. Other players such as Elyse Penaluna, Brad Hill, Emily McInerny and Brent Hobba have played in the NBL and WNBL in the 2007/2008 season and will be playing Big V Basketball in 2008.

As well as National Leagues, hundreds of other players from all levels of Big V have advanced through the competition to different or higher levels of competition throughout the world, be that overseas leagues,  interstate leagues, or US College Basketball scholarships.

The League website amassed nearly 20 million hits during the six month regular season in 2007. The League updates results on Saturday nights and Sunday afternoon as games are played and during the season regular updates occur with news and announcements. The League website is one of the most popular sporting web sites in Australia, outside the professional league websites of Cricket Australia the major football codes.

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