Eagles Preview – Elimination Final

It's been a long 10-year wait but the East Perth Eagles men return to the NBL1 West finals this Saturday and it just happens to be at home on Peter Campbell Basketball Arena against the Rockingham Flames.

It's only fitting that as the Eagles make their return to the finals in the NBL1 West men's competition that it falls 10 years after the 2014 championship and on the same year on returning to Morley Sport and Recreation Centre.

Now the brand new Peter Campbell Basketball Arena will be the scene of Saturday night's do-or-die match up for the Eagles against the Flames with the action getting underway at 7.30pm.

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It has already been a season of ending droughts for the Eagles in 2024 having beaten the Buccaneers in Geraldton for the first time since winning that championship and also just by qualifying for the finals for the first time since 2014.

Now the Eagles have the chance to end another 10-year drought on Saturday night having not beaten the Flames in 16 attempts since eliminating them in the quarter finals in 2014 on the way to winning the championship.

The Flames have become a powerhouse of the competition in recent years including winning the 2022 NBL1 West and National Championships along with then finishing in top spot at the end of 2023 and making the championship game at the National Finals.

The Flames have beaten the Eagles in the last 16 meetings between the two teams by an average of 16.9 points heading into Saturday night's match up.

It was a mixed bag of a season for the Flames but they did finish off winning six of the last nine games, and with a team featuring Devondrick Walker, Gorjok Gak, Ryan Godfrey, Justin Beard and Jeremy Combs, they remain a genuine threat.

East Perth will be without Sunday Dech who is at the Paris Olympic Games with South Sudan, but the Eagles have gone big in the back half of the season regularly starting Lee Roberts, Lukas Milner, David Okwera and then either Sharif Watson or Sebit Reath along with captain and point guard Taylor Young.

Reath is fresh off 33 points last Saturday for the Eagles against the Giants as they booked in a home final, and he can't wait to take on the Flames.

"I had no idea about that (not having beaten Rockingham in 10 years) but it's another exciting opportunity for us to tick off this year," Reath said.

"They are a very good team, but I feel like we match up with them really well and we just need to be good against them for 40 minutes. We just have to be better than them for 40 minutes on the night and that's it. Hopefully that's the case."