Hopes NBL expansion will net result
The Sunday Age
Sunday January 31, 2010
AUSTRALIA'S elite men's competition is set to be bigger and stronger next season with league boss Larry Sengstock poised to announce additional teams.Sengstock is confident extra franchises in Sydney and Brisbane will help the struggling league attract new sponsors and more interest from broadcasters.Sengstock, an National Basketball League Hall of Famer who was appointed Basketball Australia chief executive officer in April, was criticised for going ahead with an eight-team national competition for the current season following the demise of the Sydney Kings, Sydney Spirit, Singapore Slingers, South Dragons and Brisbane Bullets.But rather than have a year off and regroup like the A-League, Sengstock pushed ahead and the result has been the tightest ever competition in NBL history in terms of the differential between teams first and last on the ladder."We've come a long way this season and been able to put the ingredients together on the court that's made it an exciting competition and the players and the clubs have certainly played their part in all of that, creating a really good contest," Sengstock told The Sunday Age this week."The fact that we're this far into the season and it's still not settled as to who the finalists are is a great thing. When you go to any game now, you know it's not a fait accompli. It indicates that the work we've done this year in terms of getting control of the salary cap to make sure that the teams are evenly balanced is working, which is all part of the exercise we're going through in making sure we get everything sustainable first before we move forward."Sengstock said he had received applications from all existing teams - Perth Wildcats, Gold Coast Blaze, Townsville Crocodiles, Wollongong Hawks, New Zealand Breakers, Melbourne Tigers, Adelaide 36ers and Cairns Taipans €” for next season's competition, as well as from Sydney and Brisbane, with an announcement on the final contenders to be made next month."A major part of this year has been getting the economics right so the clubs can feel confident moving forward with the structures and the way the game is organised across the country," he said."Now we just have to get the broadcast agreements in place, get the licences for each of the teams and get the sponsorships and the economics right. It's all about rebuilding the trust and getting the support from the spectators and the media and the broadcasters and the corporate world for sponsorship."He has also not ruled out the possibility of another Melbourne team in the years ahead."I think there's no question that Melbourne can house at least another team here, because it's a proven fact that they can work off each other in the cross-derby sense, and in terms of profile and media because Melbourne is basketball's strongest base," he said."For us, moving forward right now, our focus has been on getting teams in Sydney and Brisbane, but we'll certainly be looking forward to another Melbourne team in the future."Sengstock said playing this season was a "reasonable gamble, but I think a pretty calculated gamble in that we made the decision that we needed to move forward with it"."Luckily, we had eight very committed teams and owners of those teams. We had people within those organisations who were very committed to making it work and we all banded together and did it. So as the saying goes, out of adversity comes some good things."He said the fact that four former NBL stars were playing in the NBA, including Andrew Bogut and David Anderson, as well as others playing in Europe, suggested the NBL's development pathways continued to be strong.Sengstock said it was possible for basketball in Australia to return to being as big as it was in the 1990s when teams were playing in front of sell-out crowds and most games were televised."The market has changed enormously since then, so what we've got to do is find our niche and then build from there," he said."If we're smart and do the right things, then anything could happen."
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