Breakers coach Petteri Koponen addresses his squad. Photo: © Photosport Ltd 2024 www.photosport.nz
Analysis - After a season punctuated by losing streaks and suspensions the New Zealand Breakers can only watch as the next NBL champion is crowned.
The odds were stacked against the Breakers from the offset this season and the Auckland-based basketball club lived up to pundits' low expectations by finishing ninth in a 10-team league.
New coach Petteri Koponen was signed late in the off-season after the surprise departure of Mody Maor and in an unintentional shake-up of the roster 10 players were new to the club at the start of the season.
Prior to the regular season tipping off club chief executive Lisa Edser believed they had the right recipe for success.
"Whilst everybody is new you know the ingredients are there so it's just a matter of mixing it all up right and there is a little bit of hope for the best but if you go out looking for what you know works and fits with you then I think you're already on your way to success."
However, with a 10-win 19-loss record the recipe will need a tweak over the coming months if it is to be award-winning next season.
Signs were there from the start
The Breakers lost every pre-season game they played before the 2024/25 NBL season.
Winless in the NBL Blitz, the Breakers were also a player down for their opening game after American import Freddie Gillespie copped a one match ban for a headbutt on veteran NBL player Shaun Bruce of the Sydney Kings during pre-season.
Despite being short-handed the Breakers won their opening game of the regular season against the Brisbane Bullets at HoopsFest in Perth by three points.
Seven days later the roster was struck by illness but they won their first home game at Spark Arena against South East Melbourne Phoenix to be undefeated before they headed to the United States for three games against NBA sides in seven days in three different American cities - Salt Lake City, Philadelphia and Oklahoma.
The club's head of performance Shane Connolly put the start to the season into context: "You go through this whole road trip and you think about all the physical components, but man, we were on the road for three weeks. Travelled over 21,000 miles (33,796 km) in terms of what our air travel was and just to put that in perspective an NBA team in their biggest months travels 10,000 miles in a month, and we did 21,000 in about 20 days."
Matt Mooney #13 of the New Zealand Breakers drives past Dillon Jones #3 of the Oklahoma City Thunder Photo: AFP
New Zealand were the only team still doing NBA cross-over games during the NBL season to satisfy their American owners and sponsors.
While on tour the Breakers signed the towering Tacko Fall to boost the roster during the NBA games, the club owners said.
However, Fall was injured and did not play in the NBA games. He instead joined the team in Auckland in an unusual training arrangement that raised plenty of questions about the club's intentions.
The Breakers lost their first game back in the NBL after the state-side interlude but won the second game of the double header. Despite up and down results in the weeks that followed the Breakers were sitting in second with seven wins from 10 games when the international break came around in late November.
The FIBA break
Freddie Gillespie of the Breakers (L) and Cameron Oliver of the Kings compete for a loose ball during their NBL game in Sydney. Photo: photosport
There is no disputing the turning point in the Breakers season.
The FIBA break before Round 10 saw the club let import centre Gillespie, who was ranked among the top defensive players at the halfway point of the season, leave for Italy.
This opened up a spot for Fall to officially join the team.
Fall's inclusion was not Koponen's decision. The first year head coach had never played with a 2.29 metre player like Fall during his own extensive playing days and as a coach did not know initially how to integrate him into an existing style of play that had proven successful in the early rounds of the NBL.
Fall was described by Edser and owner Matt Walsh as a "game-changer" but they probably did not expect the change they got.
Tall and short
Tacko Fall of the New Zealand Breakers during the 2024/25 NBL Season between the Perth Wildcats and the New Zealand Breakers Photo: Daniel Carson
Gillespie's departure coincided with an eight-game losing streak.
Fall was the tallest player to ever play in the NBL and having him on the court with the Breakers' shortest ever import Parker Jackson-Cartwright (at 175cm) did not work as the Breakers struggled to find a way to use Fall that matched his abilities in a fast-paced league.
The next time the Breakers won - on New Year's Eve - Jackson-Cartwright did not play because he was suspended.
The American was given a five-game ban for an incident on Christmas Day that involved him being deemed to have grabbed, pushed or mishandled a game official in a loss against the Tasmania JackJumpers.
With Jackson-Cartwright sidelined the Breakers won one of those five games and their hopes of making the competition's top six to be able to play in the post-season faded.
Jackson-Cartwright returned and the Breakers won and then lost and then lost again in game in which he picked up a rib injury that ruled him out of the Breakers' last two games of the season.
What happens next?
Jackson-Cartwright was reportedly signed to the biggest contract in the club's history but the point guard is now off-contract.
Other NBL clubs would be interested in adding Jackson-Cartwright who averaged 19.9 points and 6.2 assists in his 51 games for the Breakers to their roster next season.
After his suspension there were concerns about how Jackson-Cartwright would be treated by referees in the league.
Fall has a player option for next season but a return to Asia could also appeal to him.
The team's third import Matt Mooney is at the end of his one-year deal and before the final game was unsure if he would be back. An argument with Koponen on the sideline in the last game of the season that resulted in the American spending the second half in the locker room rather than on the floor might count against him.
Jonah Bolden, Mojave King and Grant Anticevich have all come to the end of their one-year deals and Dane Pineau's two years are up.
Sam Mennenga, Mitch McCarron, Max Darling, Next Star teenager Karim Lopez, Kaia Isaac and Alex McNaught are under contract for next season.
Sean Bairstow and Carlin Davison have an option pending for next season.
NZ Breakers Karim Lopez during the NBL Photo: Brett Phibbs
Another tiki tour?
Each season the Breakers spend a lot of time on the road but in the 2024/25 season they played home games in five different arenas in New Zealand.
Showcasing professional basketball around the country is admirable, and sometimes necessary due to court availability, but it takes away the benefits of having home games where the players are practising in their normal gym and sleeping in their own beds.
If the Breakers must return to the United States during the NBL next season the club could consider fewer road games within their own country.
