WHY does the Otago Nuggets’ NBL title mean so much?
Simple enough question.
Long answer.
Allow me to wallow for a moment.
The Jerome Fitchett buzzer-beater in 1991 was a hazy memory when I inherited the team in 2005.
Leonard King had retired. Mark Dickel was forging an impressive career in Europe. Wickliffe Press had withdrawn its sponsorship.
The days of 3000 people packing into the Freezerdome, and making enough noise to wake China, was in stark contrast to the moribund atmosphere at the Edgar Centre during most of my stint covering the team.
That first year was no hoot.
The Nuggets opened the season with 12 consecutive losses.
Off the court, the performance was even worse. A key player was convicted of drink-driving, the team trashed a hotel room, and internal squabbles threatened to unravel what remained of any team unity.
It was a bleak introduction.
My team was hopeless and it was not getting any better.
For every Miles Pearce (the first Nuggets player to win the rebounding title), there was a Rahsaan Smith — the seven-footer [2.1m] from the United States who mysteriously shrank several inches and aged four years on a plane ride over .
Smith was a royal bust and was cut after just two games. His replacement, Lemar Gayle, eventually quit after he was fined $500 by the Nuggets for bagging the team and coach in the newspaper.
I wrote that article. And before Gayle, who survived a high school shooting by the way, was marched to the airport by the man mountain formerly known as the Highlanders mascot, he phoned me to provide some critical feedback.
Very colourful language, as I recall. I checked in with management later that day to make sure Gayle had got on the plane.
It was a deflating season that ended with Basketball Otago letting the rest of the air out of the ball.
The association was struggling financially and made the decision to pull the Nuggets out of the league.
They returned the following year, 2010, with what felt like a high school team and a couple of imports.
They battled, of course. But the team had a very different feel.
Club basketball stalwart Alf Arlidge was appointed coach and his enthusiasm was infectious.
Enthusiasm does not win you basketball games, though, and the losses really started stacking up.
I barely let a week slip by without updating the count. The Nuggets got all the way up to 33 before they broke the drought.
Arlidge danced a jig that night and I had a man-hug with a seven-foot sweaty American who cried during the post-match interview — it meant that much to him.
And by then it meant that much to the basketball writer. The team had unexpectedly grown on me.
That win felt like a turning point for the franchise. Dickel returned in the twilight of his career, and the following year the Nuggets clinched a spot in the playoffs for the first time since 1997.
I spent many, many hours down in the ODT archives putting together a comprehensive list of Nuggets statistics. It is something the league should have done, but the history tab on its website was a link to nowhere for years.
That work all felt like it was for nothing when Basketball Otago narrowly avoided liquidation in 2014.
The association was saved thanks to the hard work of people like Angela Ruske. But the Nuggets went into hibernation for five long seasons.
By the time they re-emerged in 2020 and won the NBL Showdown, a much more knowledgeable lad had taken over the round.
My colleague Jeff Cheshire has reported on two titles in three years.
Jealous — very. But I’m thrilled for everyone who has endured the ups and downs that have come with following this team.
