Basketball On The Internet.

IF I was a betting man, I’d be putting the house and land package on Brisbane and Tassie being NBL fixtures in 2015-16.

Yes, we’ve heard plenty about a second Melbourne franchise and seen missives about a second New Zealand competitor out of Wellington, the return of Canberra Cannons and even talk of the NBL’s birthplace Newcastle stirring back to elite life.

Nah. I’m not getting any positive feedback on any of that right now.

With the crisis engulfing “business as usual” Knox and by default, the State Basketball Centre, that second Melbourne license is not as attractive as it was a few court findings ago.

And let’s be upfront here – Melbourne United has gone out of its way to embrace its new identity as the team for ALL Victoria and has done a bloody magnificent job, to put it bluntly.

Getting that second Melbourne team off the ground now has been made all that much harder since United shed its Tigers affiliation, if not history.

My (e)mail on Wellington Saints is also that they’d prefer another year to get their sheets (and woollen blankies) in order.

The Cannons boosters are back at the drawing board, claiming the NBL has shifted the goalposts and I’m not going to argue the point because the point is this – Brisbane WILL be back and Tasmania’s state-supported team also is on the launch-pad and counting down to ignition.

“Hopefully it all comes through,” NBL chief executive Fraser Neill told me in the aftermath of positive newspaper support from the Hobart Mercury.

“I’ve been down there earlier in the year, I met with Government and interested parties and there’s definitely groups interested.

“They have until the end of October.”

Fraser is quietly confident about Tasmania and already affirmed last week at the Blitz in Brisbane that the Queensland capital again would be represented from 2015-16.

“We have said we (the NBL) are prepared to back it but we do have a couple of groups expressing interest,” he declared, with some delight.

And why wouldn’t he be delighted?

The Blitz showed interest in a team is alive and well and with CJ Bruton now based in Ballina in northern NSW, he too should come into calculations for a role with the new club.

Just not as coach. The new Brisbane (I am now firmly in the “call them Bullets” camp) franchise needs a “name” coach for its relaunch – an Al Westover, Rob Beveridge type.

As Brett Maher found out in Adelaide, it is important to have a step in between jumping from “star player” to “NBL coach”.

Despite minimal coaching experience, he had been touted as Marty Clarke’s likely successor last year before the 36ers wisely went for the proven and exceptional Joey Wright.

Maher also wisely took to coaching at SA SBL level and found it far tougher than what it first may have seemed.

Coaching a state league team or assisting a mentor coach is a very good interim step in the process, although if anyone didn’t need that, it would have been Opals assistant and Kings coach Damian Cotter.

But already having done his grounding at other levels, Cotter still went the NBL-assistant route first and will be a one of the best decisions Sydney has made.

I already rank him amid the league’s top four coaches.

THE FIBA Women’s World Championship tips off tomorrow night in Ankara and Istanbul. Here’s my News Corp preview for the Opals: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/basketball/us-hot-favourite-but-depleted-opals-rally-behind-penny-taylor-for-a-run-at-womens-world-championship-history/story-fnii09gt-1227071651925

AUSTRALIA's indigenous finest tonight are taking on New Zealand's Maori national team in the first Trans-Tasman event of this kind.

Sadly, Patty Mills, Nate Jawai and Tyson Demos currently are tied up but for that matter, so is Steve Adams!

Here's how we reported it at News Corp: http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/sport/basketball/aussie-indigenous-hoops-stars-take-on-might-of-the-maoris-in-new-australiannz-basketball-challenge/story-fnii09gt-1227070596446