Basketball On The Internet.

BRISBANE basketball fans aren't going to wait around forever.

They are becoming increasingly impatient about the possibility of an NBL team finally returning to the city, which is a dangerous sign for the league.

I know most of my pieces have been focused on Brisbane’s return but the message doesn't seem to be getting through to the NBL or the people, if there is any, involved in trying to bring a team back to southeast Queensland.

On October 15, I wrote that the NBL and the bid group(s), need to release any information they had on a possible team, rather than keeping everything in the dark.

This was all after former NBL CEO Fraser Neill said a Brisbane team was his No.1 priority, then at the Blitz tournament last September, guaranteed a return to the league.

Even in the months which followed, we never heard any details about the bids involved and after Neill resigned, there have still been no signs of any developments. What’s the go?

Everywhere I go around Brisbane, I am asked if there is going to be a team and am constantly exposed to die-hard basketball fans, who are becoming deterred by the lack of community engagement by the NBL and any persons involved in the bid.

Isn't that one of the points the NBL and every other basketball fan see as essential to a professional sporting team … community engagement?

Well, no-one is doing themselves or the bid any favours by delaying the release of any information.

I have had people say, “sometimes you can’t give information and give hope because it may fail”, but in my opinion, especially in the case of Brisbane NBL, it would be better to keep everyone continuously updated, even if it was to fail.

At least then, the fans of Brisbane know the people involved tried.

But right now, going by the feedback from around the basketball community, the NBL risk losing fans (which they desperately need) if they don’t start talking.

There is definitely the potential for a team to thrive in Brisbane because the fans are there, as the Blitz showed, but we need to do anything we can to keep these people enthused about the direction the league is heading.

With the rise of Australian stars in the NBA and in Europe, especially Brisbane-born talents in Cameron Bairstow and Brock Motum, who just missed out on a spot with the Utah Jazz, basketball is rising in popularity.

It’s about time we capitalised on it.

*Brayden Heslehurst has been playing basketball for nearly 20 years since starting as a junior at Southern Districts Spartans (Brisbane) and Sturt Sabres (Adelaide). He played four years in the SEABL program with the Brisbane Spartans in the senior and reserves team, has coached rep and school basketball in Brisbane and been a sports journalist with NewsCorp’s Quest Community Newspapers since October, 2011.*