Basketball On The Internet.

NATIONAL Basketball League plans to expand from its existing eight clubs to 12 – maybe 13 – by 2015-16 leave one question avoided or unanswered. What about Team #9?

Team #9, for the uninitiated, is the referees team, coached by Mal Cooper, captained by Ray Hunt and managed by Bill Mildenhall.

Let’s be honest now – no team faced greater consistent scrutiny or controversy during the 2013-14 season than the officials as they endeavored to take the game back to a purer form of itself to win back spectators and fans alike.

It was easily the toughest contract any team took on, although the 36ers rising from the ashes of Ground Zero to make it almost to the summit also was a pretty formidable effort.

Now, while we sit back to listen to the administrative machinations as the cogs of the NBL big wheels turn across the off-season, again we have the exciting promise of new teams in 18 months.

There is likely to be a new team in Melbourne’s south-east, rebirth in Brisbane, Tasmania, Canberra and even across the Tasman, the Auckland-based NZ Breakers could get a derby rival in Wellington.

Exciting, yes?

Sure. But let’s revisit my earlier statement regarding Team #9.

Where are all the extra referees coming from?

It has been a 28-game regular season for the past few years and NBL CEO Fraser Neill has said everyone would like to see more games.

Don’t worry, the NBL Players Association will be on full alert when the regular season swells from 28 to 44 or 48 games.

But the question again is, where will the extra refs the NBL is going to need come from?

In SA for example, we have one referee currently hovering amid the NBL’s better refs.

Then we have another battler and the ranks thin out very quickly for NBL-quality refs.

So surely, hand-in-hand with any club expansion plans, there simply MUST be an expansion plan to also accommodate Team #9.

I don’t even need to explore the potential pitfalls of leaving the refereeing stocks as they currently stand.

Which local referee (and/or referees) are up to calling NBL games in Tasmania, for example?

They haven’t had an NBL club since 1996. For that matter, the state hasn’t had a WNBL club since 1996, either.

And without just skimming over that last fact, if the NBL will soon need to snare the lion’s share of our better referees nationwide, what level of referee is going to be calling WNBL games?

At a time when the WNBL is boasting record numbers of WNBA players, Opals and superstars from Liz Cambage to Lauren Jackson, should a league of such international quality be subjected to lower tier SEABL or state league refs?

So what’s the plan folks?

“Obviously that’s part of expansion,” Neill said today.

“I had a recent informal meeting with Raoul Kersten in Melbourne and we are starting to work things through with them.”

Maybe it is time for the NBL and its clubs to recognise Team #9 needs some cash support too.

I know only a couple of obvious NBL clubs make money so it is just another imposition to look for cash that is barely there.

But the game can only stall if Team #9 doesn’t also trial new blood and fresh faces for the journey ahead.

So when I say, maybe the league and the clubs need to throw a little splash of cash at Team #9, I mean for Mal Cooper and his group to be able to bring in new faces to try out at the 2014 Blitz tournament.

Why wait til crisis point next year ahead of the 2015-16 expansion season?

The Blitz is about trying new systems, giving lesser players court time, having a look at all of the teams so why shouldn’t Team #9 have the same benefit?

Let’s give the referees a fighting chance to keep up with a game and a league which is evolving by having them identify the potential guys and girls who can possibly take the step up and let them blow a few NBL Blitz preseason outings.

And I used the word “blow” advisedly, because some won’t be upto par.

But the NBL cannot again allow itself to potentially be devastated when senior referees start to retire, get injured (farewell to a top ref in Scott Butler last year) or suffer burn-out.

That has already happened once, at a time when we were spoilt for choice with the Mildenhalls, Crouchs, Hunts, Coopers, Weeks, Shiels, Butlers etcetera.

The stocks already are thin.

“Yes, that’s not a bad idea,” Neill said in relation to blooding faces at the Blitz.

“I’m not saying we’re committing to it but it’s all in the equation and worthy of discussion.”

It sure is. Sooner than later too.