The Rockingham Flames have just completed their biggest eight days in club history by winning the NBL1 National Championship by beating the Frankston Blues 85-74 in Sunday's championship game in Melbourne on Sunday.
Rockingham broke through last Saturday night to win its first ever NBL1 West championship in the men's competition in Western Australia which saw them book their place in the National Finals this weekend at Melbourne's State Basketball Centre.
The Flames then opened their National Finals campaign with impressive wins against NBL1 Central winners the South Adelaide Panthers and NBL1 South's Hobart Chargers to book in a spot in Sunday's championship game.
Rockingham had done that without the presence of this season's NBL1 West MVP Devondrick Walker who also was Grand Final MVP last Saturday night. He has since signed at the Brisbane Bullets and played in their two pre-season games this weekend against Melbourne United.
Four-time NBL championship winner Greg Hire also didn’t make the trip for Rockingham while their opponents were a Frankston team who qualified for the National Finals as the Wildcard team for their win over the Centre of Excellence during the season.
Frankston then stormed home for a barnstorming win over the Canberra Gunners on Friday night before winning a thriller against South Adelaide on Saturday to join Rockingham in Sunday's championship game.
It was Rockingham who got on top early and while Frankston kept battling and were inspired at times by Adrio Bailey, the Flames had too many weapons to end up winning 85-74 to win the national championship eight days after their breakthrough NBL1 West triumph.
Flames coach Ryan Petrik is now a two-time women's championship coach at Rockingham while having led the men to NBL1 West and national titles on the back of being the reigning WNBL Coach of the Year.
Petrik is building quite the legacy as a coach, but he was all about being proud of his club and players as they backed up the Warwick Senators winning the women's national title.
"It's huge for our club but probably more importantly for the whole state as well with the Warwick women also winning," Petrik said.
"Jonelle Morley and her crew have been terrific all tournament as well and then obviously for the boys, without Devondrick we had to move stuff on the fly, and they just refused to lose all weekend.
"This format for the tournament is terrific and the guys just wanted to keep playing. We polled them during the week about who wants to train and didn't get a lot of response, but they certainly got on that plane trip early Friday morning and were ready to hoop."
Marshall Nelson delivered 26 points, six rebounds and five assists for Rockingham while captain Ryan Godfrey has had a dream eight days for the club he holds so dear with another 23 points, five rebounds and three assists. He hit 4/6 from downtown and was named Championship Game MVP.
Godfrey has been the heart and soul of the Flames having grown up in Rockingham dreaming of playing with the club. And now 292 games into his career, to be NBL1 West and national champions is more than he could have dreamed of.
"To come from 28 years of not winning anything to winning last week and to back it up and get over here and get this win for the first time is unbelievable," Godfrey said.
"I don’t think it's really sunk in yet, but just to be playing here in Melbourne on the national stage is pretty big time to get this win. It's pretty big time.
"We only recruit good guys for this team and if they come with a bit of skill, fantastic. But we only want good blokes to play on our team and everyone finds a way to contribute in some way and I love them."
Three-time NBL champion Tom Jervis is now a two-time NBL1 West championship winner and a national champion too with the big man finishing with 10 points, nine rebounds and two assists.
Callum Beard added 10 points for Rockingham, Travis Durnin seven points, four boards and three assists, and Justin Beard six points and 10 rebounds.
Adrio Bailey did all he could to try and lift Frankston to the victory finishing with 28 points and 12 rebounds.
Igor Hadziomerovic added 12 points, four rebounds and three assists for the Blues, Lachie Barker 11 points, four boards, three assists and three steals, and Dillon Stith eight points, seven rebounds and two steals.
The two teams opened up the championship game trading triples between Adrio Bailey and Ryan Godfrey before a three-point play shortly after from Marshall Nelson put Rockingham back on top by three.
Igor Hadziomerovic tied scores back up with a triple of his own soon after before Rockingham began to pull away just before quarter-time with a three-pointer from Callum Beard. Godfrey then capped off the quarter with two triples of his own and the Flames were on top 28-19.
It was the battle of the sharpshooting guards early in the second quarter with Lachie Barker hitting a couple for Frankston to keep his team close but Godfrey nailed another for Rockingham to keep them on top.
Nelson then connected from downtown as well for the Flames to extend their lead back out to nine but Frankston were hanging in there and consecutive three balls from Bailey cut the margin to two just before half-time.
Barker then knocked down a long contested two to tie scores up before Bailey continued to be the man sparking Frankston as he finished strongly inside to put them in front. Barker then knocked down a huge three before the Blues took a 45-40 lead into the main break after earlier trailing by nine.
Frankston then continued that momentum to start the second half with their lead rowing to nine points before Rockingham got a steadying inside bucket from Tom Jervis.
Rockingham then started to light it up from beyond the arc with Travis Durnin hitting to bring them back within a point, and then Justin Beard tied scores up, and Jake Amos put the Flames three points on top after a stunning three-point shooting display.
An and-one from Nelson then pushed Rockingham out to a four-point edge heading towards three quarter-time but it remained a tight battle and going into the fourth term it was the Flames leading 65-63.
It was Jervis scoring inside again for Rockingham to open the fourth term to put his team back up four and then another player with NBL experience, Nelson pushed that edge out to six.
Rockingham's lead then grew to seven with Beard nailed his second triple of the afternoon but Frankston weren’t going away with their local fans getting behind them. Former Melbourne United NBL guard Hadziomerovic drained a triple and it was back to a four-point game.
It was Nelson who then nailed another three-point bomb for the Flames to push their lead back out to nine with three and-a-half minutes on the clock and with two minutes to play Nelson also knocked down a pair of free-throws to stretch the lead to 11.
From there the Flames went on to score the 12-point win to become national champions just eight days after breaking through for a first ever NBL1 West championship.
NBL1 NATIONAL FINALS – MEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP GAME
ROCKINGHAM FLAMES 85 (Nelson 26, Godfrey 23, Jervis 10, C Beard 10)
FRANKSTON BLUES 74 (Bailey 28, Hadziomerovic 12, Barker 11)
MVP: Ryan Godfrey (Rockingham Flames)
