Rick Buchanan

Rick Buchanan is General Counsel of the NBA and the league’s Chief Compliance Officer. He also serves as Secretary of the NBA’s Board of Governors.

As General Counsel, Buchanan is responsible for all legal affairs of the NBA and its affiliates, including collective bargaining with NBA players, Board of Governors and ownership matters, litigation, legislation, investigations, legal issues arising from the league’s various commercial businesses, player matters, and team and arena issues. In his role as Chief Compliance Officer, Buchanan oversees the Code of Conduct applicable to all NBA employees, and is responsible for the league’s compliance program, including anti-gambling education and enforcement, and FCPA matters.

Buchanan currently serves on the Legal Commission of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA), and is a frequent lecturer on sports law – including at the Columbia, Georgetown, Virginia, and Brooklyn schools of law.

Before joining the NBA in 1993, Buchanan was associated with the law firm of Covington & Burling in Washington, DC, where he was a litigator concentrating on professional sports and antitrust matters, and served as a judicial law clerk for Judge Kenneth W. Starr of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Buchanan is a 1985 graduate of Amherst College and a 1988 graduate of the Harvard Law School, where he served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review.