NBL Hall of Fame vs 1998 Adelaide 36ers

Here are some of the highlights from the NBL Hall of Fame vs 1998 Adelaide 36ers held last weekend. The Hall of Fame team features some of the legends we've immortalised in t-shirts so far:

• Leroy Loggins 
• Cal Bruton 
• Mark Bradtke 
• Andrew Gaze 
• Lanard Copeland
• Steve Carfino

None of them were moving too quickly or playing any defence but Kevin Brooks looks to have been the star of the show.

To represent your favourite NBL legend, check out our range of t-shirts here:
http://classicbasketballtees.spreadshirt.com/

Andrew Gaze - Melbourne Tigers

The one, the only ... Andrew Gaze
(pic below, who said he couldn't jump?)

Andrew Gaze is considered the greatest player in the history of the NBL and is a seven time winner of the league's MVP award, which is now named after him.

Gaze began his career in the NBL at age 18, being named Rookie of the year in 1984. He was the top scorer in the league for a total of 14 seasons. Not an outstanding athlete, Gaze's heavy scoring was due to exceptional shooting, including from three-point range. A crowd favourite, one of Gaze's trademark plays for the Tigers was the alley-oop pass to Lanard Copeland. Playing under his father with the Tigers, Gaze played in 612 NBL matches and led the team to two titles (’93 & ’97).

One of Andrew’s best seasons was in 1987 when he averaged 44.1 points (that’s not a typo), 8.2 rebounds, 5.8 assists, 2.5 steals & 3.4 triples.

Check out the Andrew Gaze Legends tees here:
http://classicbasketballtees.spreadshirt.com/melbourne-C157175

Melbourne Tigers t-shirts

Gather round and let me tell you about a time when the league was booming, so much so, NBL players were household names!

Back in the 90’s when the league was booming, one of the teams to beat was the Melbourne Tigers who took out their first championship in ’93 and then won it again in ’97. Lindsay Gaze prowled the sidelines while his son Andrew was the superstar. He wasn’t alone as he was joined by two of the legends of the league, Lanard Copeland and Mark Bradtke.

Fast forward to the 2000’s when the big three had moved on, a new superstar emerged for the Tigers in the form of Chris Anstey who returned from several years in Europe. Anstey dominated the league helping Melbourne to another two titles in ’06 and ’08.    

As you can see from the pic below, we’ve come up with two different styles for this team, based on the team’s classic uniforms from back in the day.

Check out our store for team nine of the "Legends" range:
http://classicbasketballtees.spreadshirt.com/

In The Game Tees on Twitter

My day has been made ... randomly just received the tick of approval for our Legends t-shirts from the greatest Australian basketballer ever!

You can now follow In The Game Tees on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/InTheGameTees

New Fox Sports team announced

After Fox dropped Steve Carfino, I thought there was a chance they would sign John Rillie, but it seems Fox have instead gone for another great shooter in "The Hammer" Shane Heal.

Media Release
22 September 2009

FOX SPORTS MAKES EVERY SECOND COUNT IN THE 2009/10 NBL SEASON

The NBL returns on FOX SPORTS with LIVE and EXCLUSIVE coverage throughout the 2009/10 season.

FOX SPORTS is gearing up for tip off in the 2009/10 NBL season, with eight teams set to battle it out in a new-look competition starting this Thursday 24 September.
Basketball fans will see up to 51 LIVE matches on FOX SPORTS, with each club to appear in a minimum of seven televised matches throughout the season.
While our biggest local stars like Melbourne’s Mark Worthington, Adelaide’s Adam Ballinger and Perth’s Shawn Redhage are set to light up the courts, FOX SPORTS has assembled a new-look team of expert commentators and analysts to take viewers inside the action with greater depth than ever before.
FOX SPORTS’ extensive coverage of the NBL will be headed by two of Australian Basketball’s greatest icons, in the league’s all-time leading points scorer Andrew Gaze and Shane ‘Hammer’ Heal.
The basketball experience of the star duo is simply unrivalled in Australia. Together they account for over 1050 NBL matches, nine Olympic Games campaigns and three NBL Championships.
Delivering the play-by-play action alongside the star pairing are two of the best in the business - FOX SPORTS’ Brian Taylor and Dwayne Russell.
The award-winning AFL commentators share a life-long involvement in basketball and a deep passion for the game.
David Malone, CEO of FOX SPORTS, said FOX SPORTS is committed to delivering basketball fans a comprehensive coverage of the season.
“The NBL has taken some hits in recent years but thanks to the dedication and passion of Larry Sengstock and his team at Basketball Australia, the competition has the opportunity to make a fresh start while continuing to deliver an entertaining and action-packed product featuring the best players our country has to offer,” said Malone.
“FOX SPORTS has covered the NBL since 1998 and based on the evidence of its sustained popularity with our subscribers, the game still runs rich in the veins of Australian sports fans,” he said.
“FOX SPORTS will broadcast 42 regular season matches, plus every game of the 2010 NBL Finals series LIVE. In total, FOX SPORTS will exclusively broadcast over 100 hours of LIVE and first-run NBL action.”
The NBL on FOX SPORTS will commence with LIVE coverage of the season-opening clash on September 24, when the New Zealand Breakers host the Cairns Taipans.

FOX SPORTS NBL BROADCAST SCHEDULE – SEPTEMBER & OCTOBER

Thu 24 Sept	New Zealand v Cairns	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 2	5.00PM
Wed 30 Sept	Melbourne v New Zealand	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	7.30PM

Fri 2 Oct	Townsville v Perth	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 2	7.30PM
Wed 7 Oct	Cairns v Gold Coast	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	7.30PM
Thu 8 Oct	New Zealand v Melbourne	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	5.30PM
Wed 14 Oct	Gold Coast v Melbourne	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 2	8.30PM
Wed 21 Oct	Adelaide v Melbourne	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	8.00PM
Thu 22 Oct	New Zealand v Townsville	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	5.00PM
Sun 25 Oct	Perth v Melbourne	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	7.30PM
Wed 28 Oct	Wollongong v Cairns	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	7.30PM
Thu 29 Oct	New Zealand v Adelaide	LIVE	FOX SPORTS 1	5.00PM

http://www.foxsports.com.au/basketball

MEET THE TEAM – NBL ON FOX SPORTS
ANDREW GAZE
The undisputed face of Australian basketball has won just about every accolade in the sport. A veteran of 22 seasons with the Melbourne Tigers and five Olympic Games campaigns with the Boomers, Gaze’s remarkable career is unlikely ever to be replicated. A seven-time league MVP, two-time NBL champion with the Tigers and the competition’s all-time leading points-scorer, he has also carved out a career as a media personality and has been a regular on the NBL on FOX SPORTS team for the past three seasons.

SHANE HEAL
‘Hammer’ is one of Australian Basketball’s most colourful characters and rose to icon status after a career that spanned 21 seasons in Australia, Greece and the US. A regular member of the FOX SPORTS NBL team in 2006, Heal returns to the microphone after ending his retirement to spend two seasons with the South Dragons, before playing the last of his 440 NBL matches with the Gold Coast Blaze in February this year. He played in four Olympic Games with the Boomers and led Sydney to their maiden NBL championship in 2002.

BRIAN TAYLOR
The 1986 Coleman Medallist and a 140-game VFL/AFL star with Richmond and Collingwood, Taylor was heavily involved in basketball as a youngster growing up in Mandurah, WA. His parents started the junior basketball competition in his home town and he later represented the WA under 16s before being snapped up by the Tigers. Even at the height of his career he continued to play competitive basketball and only this year realised a life-long ambition by playing alongside three of his four sons in their local competition. Taylor is a keen follower of the LA Lakers in the NBA.

DWAYNE RUSSELL
A keen basketballer during his teenage and school years, Russell was forced to give the game away when his footy career kicked off with the Port Adelaide Magpies in the SANFL. The 50-game Geelong Cats veteran has since forged an exceptional media career, starting out as a sports journalist with The Age newspaper in Melbourne before beginning his commentating career in 2000. Voted the 2009 best AFL commentator for his work on FOX SPORTS, Russell continues to coach basketball at junior level and like his co-commentator is a big fan of the Lakers.

More NBL updates

I mentioned last week the Australian basketball public was waiting to hear the big announcements from the NBL. The main one being the new CEO which went to Larry Sengstock (pictured below). Click on the title below to read the full announcement.

NBL > News

Sengstock takes the helm

Australian basketball has a new hand at the helm to guide it through the next stage of its commercial reform after the legendary Larry Sengstock was named as the sport's new Chief Executive Officer by Basketball Australia. Sengstock comes to basketball as an acknowledged leader in Australian sports management with exceptional experience in working with all levels of sport both locally and internationally, all range of commercial enterprises and with all levels of government.


Here's an article about Larry and what he has ahead of himself over the next few weeks.

In other "New NBL" news, word on the street has it that Brisbane and Sydney won't be involved in the first season. Here's an article by Marco Monteverde (who I used to work with at the Bullets) who chatted with Andrew Gaze about the (hopefully) upcoming season.

NBL's greatest shooters

I came across this article (below) on the NBL website. Great to see them talking about some of the great shooters that the league has seen. One GLARING ommission tho ... where is Andrew Gaze on this list?

Click on the title below to read the full story and to see who made their list.

NBL > News

By Asa Schuster, Sportal

The master of the funky jump and shooting expert, Kevin Brooks, and the human NBL almanac, Matt McQuade, sat down to critique some of the great NBL players who devastated opponents with unique and unorthodox methods of shooting.

Shane Heal.
Brisbane Bullets 1988, 1992-1995, Geelong Supercats 1989-1991, Sydney Kings 1996-1997, 2001/02–2002/03, South Dragons 2006/07-2007/08 and Gold Coast Blaze 2008/09. 20.7 points per game and 1586 three-pointers made at 38 percent in 436 career games.

KB: Shane has got a nice jump shot, definitely not short on confidence. From what I understand, I don't know him and haven't played with him, he works his ass off from what I've heard and has a very good work ethic. His jump shot is basically when he goes to the left he can shoot with anyone in the league. When he goes to his right he doesn't shoot the jump shot the same way but he definitely has an effective jump shot with lots of range.

MM: Unbelievable ball player, he's got that great shot from way back over his head. He can't jump, he's slow, physically there's a lot of deficiencies, but he played in the NBA, you've got to give that max respect and he held the Timberwolves record for most threes in a quarter. He's a flat out gunner and great player and maybe reached his peak when he was past his prime with Sydney when they won the championship, the guy was just all-world almost.

Stephen Black.
Perth Wildcats 1998/99-2002/03, Brisbane Bullets 2003/04-2006/07 and Cairns Taipans 2007/08-2008/09. 574 three-pointers made at 40 percent in 297 career games.

KB: Yeah Blacky's got a good shot, a lefty, likes to go to his left and shoot it. He's a got a quick release and when he gets it going he's as tough as Shane Heal or anyone else in the league, very efficient shot.

MM: Absolute flat out competitor, one of these guys that physically isn't what you would call a 'blue chipper', but how many times have you seen him turn the corner on someone. He can turn the corner on just about anybody when he's healthy and I think it's a damn shame he's had all the injuries.

How does this man not make the list?

Around the league

The underground media in the NBL continues to do a good job covering the league and keeping fans up to date. John Rillie and DJ Rod have just released the latest edition of the OT while Andrew Gaze and Mark Bradtke are up to Episode 7 of Gaze TV.

The OT's special guest this week is Corey "Homicide" Williams who is hilarious as always. He certainly lacks no confidence and his street-ball stories alone make this episode worth listening to. Yours truly also gets a mention right at the end.

Gaze TV is good also. Drewey's interview with Russell Hinder after the Spirit game is hilarious. Russell is in fine form as usual and I cracked up when he dropped the "its what I do" comment. Its good to see the boys are now filming indoors rather than in the car park outside Tigers training facilities ... next thing they need is a tripod. The OT has its "dodgy accent girl" announcer, Gaze TV has a dodgy camera guy with a shaky hand! Also, still no mention by them about the OT.

Quality or quantity?

Sometimes quantity IS quality ...

I just finished listening to the last episode of the OT from John Rillie and DJ Rod (I can't believe Andrew Gaze has never heard of the show) and it reminded me of something I've been meaning to comment on. At the start of the show, the "dodgy accent girl" mentions that JR is the self-proclaimed basketball blogger of the year. Now ... that's quite a statement considering the number of basketball bloggers around the place, but JR definitely has claim to the title. One thing you want from a blog is regular posts, so check out John Rillie's blog and look at the blog archive on the bottom left hand side of the page to see how many posts he gives you a month. October isn't quite over but he's already done 32 posts, September 32, August 30, July 31. Consistent and impressive stuff JR! I have work to do to try and keep up but relatively speaking I've only just started (almost two full months now).

While we're talking about John Rillie, my last post showed how I went in my NBA fantasy basketball draft (don't forget I had to pick last), where's yours JR??

(JR's blogging form is as impressive as his shooting form)

NBL coverage

If you're missing the Foxtel coverage of the NBL that you're used to or worse, like me your favourite team is no longer in the league ... there are still plenty of ways to keep up to date with the action in this "in-between" season.

The guys down in Adelaide have their own internet show "Hoops TV" (their username is: TheAdelaide36ers) and they're now up to about episode 5. Not to be outdone, Andrew Gaze and Mark Bradtke are doing similar with "Gaze TV" (their username is: 50hoges). I've watched their first two episodes so far and they're both funny guys so it makes for some light-hearted, entertaining coverage of the NBL. You can check out both shows on youtube.

Also keeping up news on the NBL are John Rillie and DJ Rod with their weekly podcasts including special guests. You can find them on JR's blog ... I've only got through two of them so far, but again interesting stuff and should take care of your NBL fix.