For the second consecutive year, the NBL1 West hosted the Perth Wildcats in a series of NBL pre-season games.
The ‘Select Team’ is made up of the best talent in Western Australia, featuring All-Star Five members and champions within the conference.
Watching the games in person, NBL analyst and the General Manager of Next Stars recruitment, Liam Santamaria explained the talent out West is continuing to grow to an NBL level.
“These were competitive games which goes to show the high level of talent that exists within the NBL1 West. I was impressed with some of the imports – guys like De’Sean Parsons and CJ Turnage – but particularly the level of the local WA talent. Johny Narkle, for example, continues to get better and better – he’s a guy I would love to see as a Development Player on an NBL team,” he told NBL Media.
“Sebit Reath, Duop’s younger brother, has some upside and a guy like Marshall Nelson is always enjoyable to watch. In fact, NBL teams should have Marshall’s name on their whiteboards again this season, in case they require an injury-replacement guard at some stage.”
Having spent the past year working within the player development sector, Santamaria added how beneficial playing in the NBL1 has been for players' development heading into their respective NBL seasons.
“The off-season is all about getting better and the NBL1 serves as a terrific platform for NBL guys to do that within a highly competitive environment,” he explained.
“There are some players involved in NBL pre-season right now who look terrific following strong NBL1 campaigns – guys like Michael Harris (Perth), Davo Hickey (Illawarra) and Angus Glover (SEM). Those guys have all used their NBL1 situations to work on different elements of their games and lift their confidence heading into a new NBL season.”
Last pre-season we saw the now-second-overall pick Alex Sarr play some of his first games in Wildcats colours against the NBL1 West. Santamaria explained that it was beneficial to his development, not only on the floor but off the court to contextualise the Australian basketball landscape.
“Those initial games against the NBL1 West Select Team were really helpful for Alex last season. He was just finding his feet with the Wildcats at the time and those games served as a great lead-up to those games against G League Ignite in Las Vegas where Alex performed really well,” he said.
“It was unfortunate that Izan (Almansa) wasn’t able to take the floor against the NBL1 West guys, but even just watching those games will have given him a sense of how the game is played in Australia and the kind of talent that exists across the different levels.”
Remember when the now No. 2 overall pick Alex Sarr played against the @NBL1_West Select Team? ?
— NBL1 (@NBL1) June 27, 2024
It was only 10 months ago ? pic.twitter.com/r06SNPn6MU
Should we see other conferences try this format? Which conference would have the best select team?
