It always makes me laugh how people get so obsessive with seeing the fixtures early. In reality, the job to complete fixtures, coordinate venues, compats and times is enormous.

I do the fixtures for an association and nowhere near this size so cannot imagine the amount of work that it must take.

Realistically, you've signed up for a tournament so regardless of time or venue, you're going to be busy that weekend.

(tl;dr: BB doesn't know when they'll be released)

Eltham, Nunawading - draws usually come out the week before. Classics, U14 nationals are more pre-selected and they know how many teams so draws out earlier. Eltham / Dandenong is massive and the logistics of organizing are huge. The tournament usually takes everyone - so the grading and amount of games depends on numbers. I'd expect them to be up by Monday 20th.

However, if participants are from anywhere except Melbourne (I understand that it IS the centre of the basketball universe) they will need to factor travel time. I have family whose game time is Friday arvo...and they need to travel from interstate, then allow for time off work and get to the game. If their first game was Saturday morning it's a completely different scenario. Not everyone has basketball as the centre of their entire lives so a bit of a 'heads-up' is appreciated.

Don't they have computer apps to generate this sort of thing? A mate of mine created one 15 years ago, so good ones must be around

I thought Eltham / Dandy tourney gave the teams options of playing Friday night or not if travelling ? Biggest concern now with interstate tourneys is unreliability of airlines - bumping flights by a day or half day etc

As BigJ said...if your flying from interstate yeah you know you're going to be at the courts all weekend but what if they slot you a friday night game? You need time to organise etc...

that's what I was saying - if you are a travelling team - they used to ask are you or do you want a Friday arvo / night game ?

Are they just rostering them now ? Otherwise your team organizers should've been asked.

@MICHAEL_MACGYVER,

If previous EDJBT's are anything to go by, expect to see the Fixtures out on the Monday before the tournament. So this, year that would be next Monday 20th January.

However, they could be released as late as the evening of next Wednesday 23rd January.

And as some of the other posters have said, teams entering from Interstate are usually given the option of playing their first game on Friday Afternoon, Friday Evening, or Saturday when they enter the tournament.

New post on the FB page says fixtures out by the end of the weekend.

Yeah I saw that....thanks Reggie

Never believe what you read on Facebook ;)

MONDAY at the earliest !!!

It's up

Finally the draw is up....having said that how can you tell its a Dandenong run tournament? When one of there teams is put in a grade clearly as an ego boost...

Check this grade out all of the teams in it are going for VJL3 or 4 (according to playhq and the grading map) except the Dandenong team going for VJL2?

How does that even work?

https://websites.mygameday.app/comp_info.cgi?a=FIXTURE&compID=646179&c=0-9202-0-0-0

Wouldn't be surprised to see some massive scores in there games.

Yiks, thats a big call Longtime_BBALL but nothing surpises me any more in the world of junior basketball.

I wouldn't be too concerned Longtime. No one cares who wins the tournament, it should be used more as prep for the upcoming season so playing some harder games will help. Won't help the team you mention though. Good luck!

has the website melted down ? just sits on loading then nothing ?

would be getting a huge amount of hits at present

I gave up on it

not sure if it was this tourney or another big one but the websites have melted down previously

I had a sticky beak at the Dandenong Casey game in the above mentioned age group last night...I must admit that Casey coach had his team locked in on defense all game and rotated his entire team no two players spent got massive court time can't say the same for Dandenong who looked to have only run there starters for most of the game....was really impressive to watch so much so that the Dandenong team looked a bit rattled - especially with 9 team fouls with 4 minutes to go.

Looked like had the Casey team hit there free throws and made some three pointers it would have been the first potential upset of the tournament.

Will be interesting to see how both teams go for the remainder...would be great to see them duke it out in the grand final match later in the weekend if last nights game was anything to go by - also loved seeing the Casey coach so animated his players really fed off his energy.

Any way good luck to all those playing - tournament website is rubbish as well but looks like you all already know that

Wow there are some disgusting parents around....we played at Chelsea all weekend and man some of the parents going the young refs was insane...Saw one parent go nuts from Melbourne and another from Western Port right up inn the refs face...

Knox?

Na at Patterson River Secondary (CHL) watched two games were parents went nuts...one parent from a Melbourne team walked up to some Casey kids who were doing nothing but standing waiting for there game with there coach and she went nuts at them couldn't here what she was saying but a lot of a finger pointing...

And another walked onto the court at the end of the game I think she was a western port parent she went up to the full striped ref (there was a green on the court as well) and blasted him finger in the face etc...and people wondering why we struggle for refs

like the players - refs can get fatigue - 6th, 7th or 8th game for the day - in the heat too.

Do the players hit all their shots ? Do the refs make all the right calls ?

Expect mistakes from everyone.


No refs = no game. (you don't want parents or fill ins reffing)

Some adults need to pull their heads in.

I had noticed pre COVID the level of competitiveness off court for the junior games was heating up over the years.

Having said all that - some of the investment from families is huge.

The tournament is huge.

Diamond Valley U16 Girls very impressive tournament.

Agreed, @Cesp. I thought Kilsyth would dominate that game and the opposite occurred.
Sandy U18 girls look like theyre playing at a different level to the other sides, they'll be hard to beat when the season kicks off in a few weeks time.

Hard to take a form line from this tournament with teams in pre-season, missing pieces, different rotations and goals, and a compromised draw particularly for A grade. Great tournament though - unbelievable organisation and good fun if taken the right way. App could be better is my only constructive comment.

I believe Kilsyth 16 girls played with 8 with two of their top scorers and starting five out - looked like fatigue got them - will be a very different team once they are back to full strength

App may be able to handle the traffic better ? any IT people know if that is the case ?

The GameDay app is woefull full stop.

PlayHQ is way better.

over 1800 teams - one wonders at what the capacity is.

Yes play HQ the best for on line IMO - the others are ok and get it done.

South has eclipsed Sturt's record amount of club entries from SA - South around 43 such and awesome effort. I'd imagine some of them would've had to find accommodation a fair way away.

It really was a great tournament but I wonder if it is it too big now and becoming unmanageable, resulting in:

Referees shortages and needing to advertise for referees on Sunday morning?

Program being released as late as Friday for the whole weekend.

Gfs played at 4pm when advertised as all finals will be finished by 2pm so interstate teams could plan going home or booking flights?

Playing two games within two hours of each other both Saturday and Sunday was dangerous in some venues especially a facility such as nunawading which resembled more of a sauna than stadium.

I understand what GWC is saying about the tournament being too big, but it is a glorious event. I've been attending for 43 years, and the growth has been phenomenal. But even better- being able to play club teams and specialist academy teams from NZ and interstate is special- and normally only reserved for the most elite teams attending national club championships or classics.
For Eltham (and Dandenong) people, I wonder how much economic activity (a buzzword in sport funding documents) is generated by this single tournament in a small Australian sport- I doubt there is another community sports event that comes close.

well from one state alone - probably 75 teams with 8 players on average = approx 600 players and then say 500 families - accommodation for 2,000 + persons - all paying $100 a night for accommodation (average) 200,000 per night just staying somewhere - add meals out, petrol, flights or hire cars - all at premium (Australian Open time too).

Big business boost to the Melbourne economy

Despite its size, it is still the best run tournament of its kind.

They certainly had their struggles with referee numbers to support the event this year. Perhaps there could be an incentive for interstate officials to travel across for the event also? That could certainly help and enables refs from each state to learn from each other.

I saw games where you had a club or academy team from NZ or Tasmania, playing teams from states such as SA and WA, NSW etc. the organisers did a pretty good job of mixing it up to ensure diverse, competitive grades which is often hard to do when grading teams from different states and countries! The number of teams participating plays a massive role in that.

My kids and family loved it.

Basing teams in the one venue on the same day (for the majority), and also teams in the morning or afternoon (for the majority), was a masterstroke. Trying to group as many interstate club teams together at the same venue to faclitate community is fantastic.

Making the effort to adjust fixtures for finals etc due to the forecast heat goes to show just how much they cared to ensure everyone got a chance to complete their tournaments.

Well done to everyone involved. Massive effort and achievement.

Well said LC, some positive feedback on this forum is hard to find.
Massive job organizing an event as big as this, there are inevitably some issues along the way and it wont be perfect, but it was and is an incredibly well run event.

I think that the Easter Classic organisers should be taking some notes on what worked and did not work for the EDJBT.

Definitely agree with others: there is a MAJOR need to move across to PlayHQ / MyHoops app ASAP for the EDJBT (and Easter Classic). GameDay app is past its use by date and should be scrapped.

Big wins: having games grouped.

Big fails: GameDay website/app. Surely this was its final straw

Was surprised to see so many Frankston teams playing at home at Frankston stadium. At least the new carpark there is open now.

Continue to be stunned that Casey didn't bother putting any HVAC/aircon into the 'old' stadium when they built the new. Not as bad as Nuna but not far off

Great weekend all round

Interesting to note the Dandy team mentioned above in the thread, while they did have a couple of big wins, lost at the semi-final stage, but saw similar things in low-level 14s grades too

Speaking of Dandy teams, did anyone watch the U16 boys grand final on YouTube? This Dandy team easily dispatched the top WA and SA teams in the semis and GF. They have formidable bigs and absolute elite 3 point shooting guards. Going to be hard to beat this year.

LC - Sturt first started the one club at one stadium (Dandy) 15-20 years ago. Dandy could facilitate that - bit harder on the Eltham side - smaller stadiums. Unless you could get the state basketball centre.

But then the Air Cond stadiums need to be shared around.

I like the idea of Norwood Tournament taking notes - Norwood is starting to surge again.

Some decent stadiums (4+ courts, including 8 at Diamond Valley) on the Eltham side now too, so they were able to better accommodate this over the last couple of years.

Big fan of the hubs keeping grades at the same venue with consistent timeslots.

Another awesome weekend.

As per usual we had a team who smashed everyone in their pool who are currently grading 2 div higher than the rest in VJBL, seems to happen every year.

The rest of our pool was spot on and provided a fantastic bunch of close games.

Everyone needs to treat it for what it is, a final tune up before the VJBL season. So many parents/coaches acting like it was game 7 of the NBA finals.

I watched a heap of games over the weekend and as a coach it was hilarious to sit back in the stands and listen to some of the parents comments. When I'm standing court side trying give instructions, weekends like this make me realise why I can’t get players to listen sometimes when their auntie/uncle/sister/grandpa is yelling at them to pick up a player!

It’s a massive event, and other than some missing refs on Monday (can’t blame them, a huge weekend for them as well), ran faultlessly for us.

At the end of the day my kids loved the weekend and for us that’s all that matters.

I don't particularly mind parents yelling from the sideline as long as it coincides with what the coach wants. If they a parroting the coaches instruction it can be effective for the team as a whole like bench support.

Times have changed . Mentally these kids need all the help they can get. I prefer to work with the parents rather than run a dictatorship in that regard.