New NBL CEO eyes Gather Round-style basketball event, expansion, next broadcast deal and more
The new chief executive of the NBL has high hopes for basketball in Australia, and he’ll be involved in critical negotiations ahead of the sport’s next broadcast deal.
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The architect of the AFL’s Gather Round has been tasked with adapting the concept to provide the NBL with a unique festival of basketball.
Over seven years with the AFL, new NBL chief executive David Stevenson helped the league navigate the Covid crisis and masterminded the code’s answer to the NRL’s Magic Round, with last month’s bumper nine-game slate involving all 18 teams played across three Adelaide venues.
Through his work in footy, Stevenson has built strong relationships with state governments and key commercial and sporting partners across the country. The NBL believes those connections have him perfectly placed to fast-track the league’s burgeoning growth — and implement a Gather Round-style event tailored to basketball.
It’s not so much about the games — although he says all five would need to be played for points to ensure the competitive stakes — but how the league could build a festival around those clashes that would attract people from all over the country.
“We thought we would get 28,000 people come from interstate into South Australia (for Gather Round),” Stevenson said.
“We ended up getting 77,000.
“As the NBL, we’ve got to work with a concept that’s compelling for the clubs, players, government, venues and broadcasters so when we go to the fans they’ll embrace it.
“We could work with Basketball Australia on representative games. Could we have a festival where you can come and learn how to play NBA2K? Come and meet your favourite players and get autographs and selfies and have a skills contest with them? Are there elements of an all star game? That’s where you really build the content outside the five games.
“We need to give people in other states a reason to get in the car and drive eight hours, or get on a plane and travel and that’s not just to watch their team but be a part of an event.”
Stevenson cautioned there would be unique challenges the NBL faced.
An extra week was built into the AFL fixture to accommodate Gather Round, ensuring venue commitments across the country were honoured. The NBL is a different beast. Without a multi-billion dollar broadcast deal, clubs rely heavily on home gate takings. It will take a mighty effort to convince them to give up a home game to play interstate.
“Every club would love to have it in their state, but can we get it to where there’s an opportunity over a period of a number of years, it’s played in different states?” Stevenson said of how the league might sell the round to clubs.
WHAT COULD A GATHER ROUND LOOK LIKE?
Stevenson doesn’t officially start in the role until next month, so he’s yet to scratch the surface on the what, when and where.
But, from the outside looking in, the Melbourne sports precinct that hosts the Australian Open and features two basketball-capable venues in John Cain and Rod Laver arenas looms as a potential location to inaugurate the event.
Similar to the Open — perhaps not on as grand a scale — the league could turn the precinct into a basketball Mecca, tying in its NBA 2K League team and leaning into ties with the NBA to bring out legends from the US to add an aura. Throw in traditional three-point and slam dunk competitions and maybe a celebrity game.
As far as the fixtures go, a Throwdown between the two Melbourne teams and a Sydney v Perth grudge match on the bigger RLA, with three clashes on JCA, culminating in an all star game would make compelling viewing.
There’s chatter every year about bringing back an all star game — the last was held in Adelaide in 2013, South thrashing North 134-114, then Melbourne Tigers gun Chris Goulding the MVP with 24 points.
A State of Origin concept could offer a different look. If held in Victoria, a Big V team, made up of Victorians and imports could face off against an Aus-NZ Allies, which would engage fans all over the two countries.
Imports could be used to fill out state teams — imagine the Red Army’s reaction to Bryce Cotton pulling on the Big V?
POTENTIAL ALL STAR TEAMS
***Players signed for NBL24 only
VICTORIA
Bryce Cotton, US (Per)
Dejan Vasiljevic, Canada/Tarneit (Syd)
Nathan Sobey, Warrnambool (Bne)
Mitch Creek, Horsham (SEM)
Alan Williams, US (SEM)
Shaun Bruce, Horsham (Syd)
Ariel Hukporti, Togo/Germany (MU)
Anthony Drmic, Endeavour Hills (Tas)
Tyler Harvey, US (Ill)
ALLIES
Will McDowell-White, Qld (NZ)
Mitch McCarron, NT (Ade)
Chris Goulding, Tasmania (MU)
Keanu Pinder, Per (Per)
Jo Lual-Acuil Jr, South Sudan/Perth (MU)
Shea Ili, NZ (MU)
Sam Waardenburg, NZ (Cns)
Sam Froling, Qld (Ill)
Aron Baynes, NZ/Qld (Bne)
NEXT BROADCAST DEAL
The NBL has enjoyed huge growth across Foxtel and Kayo but, on free-to-air, it is tucked away on one of Network 10’s minor channels, in standard definition.
With the league’s current deal up at the end of next season, Stevenson will be part of critical negotiations over the next NBL broadcast rights.
He doesn’t necessarily see free-to-air television as the be-all and end-all. He does, however, believe it’s not a question of if, but when the league will be beamed into homes on free-to-air in prime time.
“I can certainly see a time where people on a primary channel on a Friday night sitting down with their family and friends enjoying an NBL game,” he said.
“You can see the growth that's happened on ESPN and Kayo and Foxtel, it’s incredible.”
NBL23 delivered a near-50 per cent spike on last season’s audience on broadcaster ESPN and Kayo platforms. Live telecasts were up 46 per cent on last season, and NBL games outrate most NBA broadcasts three-to-one.
EXPANSION
NBL owner Larry Kestelman has already had talks with a consortium about resurrecting a Gold Coast team. He’s floated two new teams entering the league by 2026 with expressions of interest from Perth, Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, Newcastle, Townsville and Darwin on his desk.
Stevenson said the No. 1 priority would be to ensure, wherever and whoever took on the next NBL franchises, they were set up for long-term success.
“We’re having those conversations with states and territories across Australia and New Zealand, but it’s about fans and venues and corporate partners and we’re not going to expand for expansion’s sake,” he said.
“We’re on this great growth trajectory at the moment, but it’s how we become sustainable in that growth so that we’re not, in five years time, thinking about clubs that are no longer in the NBL again.”
NEXT STARS
Stevenson confirmed part of early expansion talk has involved a potential team of Next Stars.
The program, which brings in young talent from all over the world and places them on team rosters with the view to the NBA draft has produced the likes of stars LaMelo Ball and Josh Giddey.
Each club is limited to one Next Star but Stevenson said a team of overseas talent, potentially mixed with veterans and imports, had been floated.
“There’s been lots of interest in terms of what a Next Stars team may look like,” he said.
“The internal conversations are quite preliminary but you only have to look at the momentum that’s come from individual players and say ‘what could that look like as a stand-alone team’? “We’re keen to explore it.”
JACKJUMPERS SALE AND AFL’S TASSIE MOVE
It’s no secret the NBL is attempting to sell the expansion JackJumpers and Stevenson said the league was hopeful of securing Tasmanian-based ownership.
“In a perfect world, the JackJumpers would be primarily owned by people or businesses in Tasmania,” he said.
“They’ve really been embraced as the team of Tasmania. We want to use this opportunity to strengthen that bond, hence, in terms of the (sale) process, we’re only talking to people within Tasmania at the moment.”
He believes the new AFL club, set to join the competition in 2028, will be a plus for the JackJumpers.
“They’re playing in the winter and we’re playing in the summer so there's no direct competition and there’s an opportunity for a great partnership between those two teams,” he said.
HELPING THE WNBL
The WNBL is struggling with multimillion-dollar losses and Basketball Australia has tapped the NBL to help set it on a path to sustainability.
Many want Kestelman and the league to take over.
Stevenson said the NBL’s interest in helping right the ship in the women’s competition came with the belief its success would benefit the whole sport.
“We’re not just in it for NBL growth, we want to grow the game of basketball,” he said.
“What we’d love, more than anything, is for the WNBL to be successful and for the clubs and owners and players to benefit.
“I’ve reached out to (BA chief executive) Matt Scriven and whatever we can do to help, we’re open to it.”
ASIAN FRONTIER
Stevenson spent 17 years working all over the world for Nike, so he knows his hoops and has an intricate knowledge of the Asian market, where Kestelman is hellbent on establishing a foothold.
Kestelman has floated the return of the former Singapore Slingers, there’s talk of an Asian champions league-style format and potential for exhibitions in basketball-mad nations all over the continent.
“The love of the game in Asia is incredible and it’s in our timezone, so that works in a lot of ways, particularly from a broadcast point of view,” he said.
“We’re having some great conversations with FIBA, the leagues in Asia, national sporting organisations there, broadcasters and promoters, so there’s a whole gamut of opportunities.
“It’s not the NBL pushing ourselves onto them, they’re approaching us, they’re wanting to have conversations and that’s a good place to be.”
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