SuperCoach NBL winner reveals the team that will kick off his title defence for NBL25

How does the first winner of SuperCoach NBL plan to back to back? One team makes up almost half his starting squad. See his team here, plus expert advice.

It is now under two weeks until tip-off of the NBL25 season. This off-season has felt like an eternity, but we are finally here.

At the time of writing this article, the NBL Blitz was just about to get underway on the Gold Coast. With tickets for children aged between 5-14 years starting at just $10, I am looking forward to taking the family down later in the week to catch some of the pre-season action.

Let’s get stuck into how I have structured my SuperCoach NBL team for the start of the season.

There are still several things that could change between now and the start of the season – the NBL Blitz might throw up some curve balls for us to consider. For the most part however, I do not foresee my general thought process around the structure of my team changing.

In my earlier pre-season articles, I have highlighted the importance of focusing on the NBL schedule when assembling your NBL squad. If we take a quick look at the schedule for the first 4 rounds, we can identify which teams we need to target for our starting squads:

Round 1 – All teams play once.

Round 2 – Hawks, United, Phoenix and Kings play twice

Round 3 – 36ers, Taipans, United, Wildcats and JackJumpers play twice + Breakers have a bye

Round 4 – 36ers, Taipans, and Kings play twice + Breakers have a bye

Everyone will interpret this schedule differently, but I think we can all agree on the following:

WITH all our SuperCoach NBL players contributing to our weekly score, it would be wise of us to refrain from having any New Zealand Breakers players in our starting squad considering we will need to trade them out prior to their round three and four byes.

OUR teams need a sprinkling of Hawks, Phoenix, Kings, 36ers and Taipans players to start the year.

FOCUSING on United players due to having the earliest back-to-back DGW rounds.

Illawara’s Sam Froling is one of David’s favourite players. Picture: Matt Roberts/Getty Images

I plan on starting the season with 3-4 Melbourne United players and have a longer-term plan to retain two of these players for United’s DGW stretch occurring in rounds 6, 7 and 8.

It is important to remember we have two guaranteed trades each week plus four Trade Boosts up our sleeve.

FORWARDS

Sam Froling and Jack White on court + Robert Loe and Lachlan Olbrich on bench

Jack White will be one of the highest owned SuperCoach commodities to start the year. Aside from the fact he is a United piece, he appears to be very well priced at $232,000. His last season in the NBL was in 2021 when he averaged around 23 minutes per game and just over 20 SuperCoach points per game.

The arrival of Darius Days at Illawarra does throw a spanner in the works for bench pick Lachie Olbrich. But I just cannot ignore what this talented 20-year-old bloke did over in the NZNBL competition. Olbrich was awarded the MVP of the 2024 season amassing season averages of 20.1 points, 11.9 rebounds, 3.1 assists and 1.1 blocks per game ... ah yep, that’s like over 40 SuperCoach points per game! The big question is will he get his opportunity to shine in this Illawarra Hawks outfit?

Froling and Loe round out my selections. Loe is a United player with DPP status who I think should get some solid minutes in their rotation. Froling is one of my favourite big men in the league. He has a DGW in round 2 for the Hawks and, again, his DPP status offers some flexibility trade-wise should injuries hit my team during round 1.

CENTRES

Jordan Hunter on court + Rocco Zikarsky on bench

Zikarsky is entering his second season as an NBL Next Star. The Bullets are totally irrelevant schedule wise early in the season but at a starting price of $95,700, I think he is a must-have from a cash generation perspective.

Jordan Hunter is my POD to start the season. Currently owned by 3.7 per cent of the competition, Hunter is reasonably priced at $256,300 and has a DGW in round 2. I think Hunter plays an important role for his new team. He had a solid hitout against United in a pre-season game where he scored 26 SuperCoach points in 17 minutes.

Jack White will be a very popular selection this season. Picture: Matt Roberts/Getty Images

GUARDS

Shea Ili and Ian Clark on court + Taran Armstrong & Ben Henshall on bench

I think it is fair to say we do not have a wealth of bottom-dollar cheapies to help our cash generation this year. I am going to take a punt on Ben Henshall finally getting some opportunity to shine. Last year he unfortunately averaged just 6.1 minutes per game. This pre-season he has again showed what he is capable of with SuperCoach scores of 32 and 26. With DPP status, a starting price of $69,000 and a BE of just 6, we just need the young man to see 10-plus minutes of court time. C’mon Coach Rillie – put him in!

Taran Armstrong is a serious young talent who will play a significant role for the Taipans this season. At $193,000 with DGWs appearing in rounds 3 and 4, I am happy to have Taran inserted onto my bench.

Shea Ili ($250,200) and Ian Clark ($234,800) are my on-court starters. At under 5 per cent ownership, these two selections are going to either be a disaster or a masterstroke. I like their price points to start the year, and I think both players will see expanded roles this season. Both players have demonstrated an ability to accumulate stats in a variety of ways and that is exactly the type of SuperCoach players we are looking for. There is no doubt they lack the ceiling of other guards who have DGWs across rounds 2 and 3, but their price point allows us to squeeze players like Armstrong and Loe onto our bench.

How Dave's team looks heading into this season.

WHO HAS MISSED OUT?

Sydney Kings players – The Blitz is going to give us some insight into how the Kings are going to handle the rotation of what is arguably the most talented NBL squad this year. I wanted to start my year with Jaylen Adams, but his starting price of $392,000 makes him hard to squeeze in. We also need to ask ourselves will he handle the ball as much as he did last year in this stacked side?

Keanu Pinder – Pinder at times seemed to find it hard to adjust to the Wildcats system last year. He also played less game time than I think many of us thought he would. I am positive he plays more minutes this year and is in for a cracking NBL25 season.

Originally published as SuperCoach NBL winner reveals the team that will kick off his title defence for NBL25