2028-2029 Season
The NABL's thirrd season started off with the league's first team rebrand. Seattle, who shared the nickname “Express” with the Austin franchise, elected to reinvent themselves as the “Lightning”. The Austin and Seattle ownership worked through the decision on their own. “We had franchises from a number of leagues coming together so having some overlap in branding was somewhat expected.” a league spokesman said. “We allowed them both to keep the Express name and they came up with a solution on their own.”
Once the season rolled around there were some surprises in the East as Buffalo, Providence and Tampa Bay all pushed past Montreal to claim the top three playoff spots. For Buffalo and Providence it was their first playoff appearances.
Out West the playoff field looked quite familiar with Hawaii, Long Beach, Omaha, Arizona and Las Vegas all making their third straight playoff appearances.
St. Louis guard Donnell Carney led the league in scoring, putting up 26.9 PPG. Nashville's Kris Lucas, the leader last season, finished second.
Carolina's 7'2” beast Ekpe Udoh led the league with 15.2 rebounds per game, edging out Mario Garibaldi, who led the league last year.
Sarunas Stojic once again led the league in assists per game at 12.3 per game, nearly two more than the next closest player.
Mario Garibaldi made it two straight MVP and Defensive Player of the Year Awards.
Vancouver's BJ Cox averaged 15.5PPG, 10.6RPG and 3.5PAG, stuffing the stat sheet and taking home rookie of the year honors.
Omaha got nearly 23PPG from sixth man Rolando Lydon, earning him the league's Sixth Man of the Year award.
Toros Patrick Evans III picked up the Most Improved Player award.
Honu head coach “Triple L” claimed a second straight Coach of the Year award after leading Hawaii to their third straight 40+ win season.
MVP Mario Garibaldi headlined the All-League squad and BJ Cox led the All-Rookie squad.
After the awards were all doled out it was time to move onto the NABL's “second season”, the playoffs.
The only upset in the first round was in the East with the sixth seed Bronx Ballers taking down the third seeded Tampa Bay Admirals in five games. Virginia Beach took Montreal to five games but couldn't close them out. Providence and top seed Buffalo each won their series in four games. Out West all the top seeds prevailed with Las Vegas and Arizona being the only series to go five games. Hawaii and Long Beach each won in four games while Omaha swept Albuquerque.
In the second round there was more drama with three of the four series going at least six games. Providence made quick work of The Bronx, sweeping them in four games. In the other series in the East it was top seed Buffalo taking down Montreal in six games. Out in the West it was Long Beach over Omaha in six games. Hawaii and Arizona gave us a tremendous series with the Honu prevailing in seven games. The top two seeds in each conference made up the final four teams with Hawaii vs Long Beach and Buffalo taking on Providence.
The conference finals were somewhat anti-climatic with Hawaii and Buffalo handling Long Beach and Providence in five games each. This set up a championship series between the top two teams in the league with Hawaii being the favorites going in.
Hawaii claimed their second league championship, running through Buffalo in five games. Big man Dimitris Alexandris led the way for the Honu.