LV
Years ago
NBL finals experience as a factor
I've always believed that experience was an important component of finals success.
Of course, there are plenty of examples of inexperienced teams winning the ultimate prize- refer to the Baby Bombers of 93 or the Hawks of 08 as classic Australian examples, or in basketball we could look at the Pistons of 2004 knocking off a Shaq led Lakers team who were going for their 4th championship in 5 years and had just added Karl Malone and Gary Payton. But I’ve always thought of those as being rare, as the exception rather than the rule. Because typically great players and their teams go deep into the playoffs at least once, if not multiple times, before winning a championship.
We’ve got the Cats and Breakers- who are filled with guys who have won multiple championships together. Then you’ve got the Hawks who are led by two guys who both won MVP’s and won it before with those two clubs- Lisch won a GF MVP and an MVP, and Penney’s got credentials- he scored 38 to stave off elimination at The Jungle in a classic against Lisch’s Wildcats before going on to win it all.
Then we have United. A relatively young and inexperienced team. Of their top 6, 2- Majok and Holt- are in their second professional season. Blanchfield’s only 24. Goulding’s now one of the league’s elite players but has limited NBL playoff experience. Two years ago he looked overawed by the occasion and struggled in the semi finals.
Kickert and Warrick do bring lots of experience, but the roster itself is brand new. So is the Hawks -you could say- but really they have a core who have played together for 5 years (Forman, Davidson, Martin, Coenradd) and they added 2 very experienced superstars plus Ogilvy. And of course the Breakers can put a 5 on court who have won 3 championships together (Jackson Webster Abercrombie Vukona Pledger) and Perth have Martin, Beal, Wagstaff, Redhage, Knight, Hire and Jervis who cover all positions on the court and are all long term Wildcats.
This is one of the most even seasons I can remember. Heading into the playoffs, very little splits the top 4 teams in my mind. All have their own strengths and weaknesses but in terms of overall ability there isn’t a lot separating them. All 4 have had stretches where they looked like the team to beat. Obviously those with home court deserve favouritism. But only 3 of the 4 teams are filled with proven professional finals winners. How heavily does the "experience" factor count against United- both individual finals experience and long term roster cohesion/roster inexperience- now that we’re at the business end? How much does all of this matter? Does this figure in your own predictions about who will come out on top?
