Basketball On The Internet.

BRISBANE Bullets months ago made no secret of the fact free agents Adam Gibson, Chris Goulding, Rhys Martin, Brock Motum and Nathan Jawai were key names on their NBL shopping list.

The bad news for new coach Andrej Lemanis is Melbourne United shortly will announce it has retained MVP runner-up Goulding for two years, with an option for an additional year.

Whether he has been re-signed as a marquee Aussie remains to be seen when the NBL reveals all the player salaraies because my (e)mail is the scoring star will be on around $400K per annum.

The Bullets had planned to reunite Goulding and Gibson in the backcourt, the latter still a strong chance to wind up back in Brisbane.

Martin, like Motum, is a Brisbane boy, making any bid for him a more obvious one than Illawarra Hawks fans might realise.

Motum would be pursued as a returning Aussie marquee player and with Goulding out of the equation, Brisbane will amp up its bid for Cam Bairstow.

Now why Bairstow, also a Brisbanite, would want to turn his back so soon on an evolving NBA career also is a question for the ages.

But there's no faulting the returning Bullets franchise for aiming high.

Jawai is a Queenslander and also is a valid target.

Add potentially three imports and it's not hard to see why the Bullets are excited about 2016-17.

Even if they lost the race for Goulding (above).

IN other news, the 36ers beat sister CBA team Shandong 87-79 in their first tour game in China on Wednesday but last night lost 74-75.