Well, to be a better athlete you don't have to have a really low body fat %.  However, if your looking at losing bf not weight, I'd say focus more on high intensity rather than standard "jogging" type cardio.  Here are a couple of suggestions:

1. Swimming - 10 x 50 m sprints Freestyle (and similar swimming sprint focused workouts)
2. Boxing - Heavy bag, speed bag, shadow boxing, etc
3. METCON (Metabolic Conditioning): Crossfit or gymnastics type workouts, for example: Run 1 mi, 100 pull ups, 200 PUSHUPS, 300 Squats, Run 1 mi for total time

If you add two of these type workouts per week to your current plan, you'll be in great total body shape.  Tough to recover so be careful.

Not sure, give it a shot and keep track of the results.  I know that when I was playing ball everyday for 2 hours a time, my body fat was higher than when I lifted, swam and did MMA.  However, there are plenty of variables outside of those that definitely affected it! 

So if you've got your nutrition dialed in, and it works, keep doing it.  I would suggest that if BF% loss is your goal, stop just weighing yourself, buy some calipers and check your bf% instead.  That way you can accurately track your changes.

no

Lower your calories and take anabolic assistance.

In all seriousness, if you're a basketball player you should be bulking up. And don't worry about "lifting for strength and not mass". On a calorie deficit you're not going to gain mass. That's against the laws of thermodynamics.