JackJumpers creating "destination" club

JackJumpers CEO Christine Finnegan has rubbished claims that player retention should be an issue for the island state’s incoming AFL side, following Tasmania’s NBL24 triumph over Melbourne United.

The JackJumpers overcame the top-seeded United side in the decisive Game 5 thriller on Sunday night to lift the club’s first title – and the first NBL title won by a Tasmanian team since 1981.

A total of six players – Jarred Bairstow, Fabijan Krslovic, Sean Macdonald, Will Magnay, Jack McVeigh and Clint Steindl – from Tasmania’s NBL22 Championship Series defeat featured on the roster for this season’s triumph, while former player Jarrad Weeks is now a member of Scott Roth’s coaching staff.

“That annoys me a bit when I hear it, they’re getting an opportunity to play AFL football and they should go anywhere to do that, but the second part of that is it’s the most beautiful state,” Finnegan told SEN.

“Jack McVeigh has bought a house here, Milton Doyle wants to get citizenship, Jordon Crawford wants to come back, these guys come from all over the world and they come to Tassie and they love it.

“We do want to create a destination club, we do want to focus on the one percenters when they get there to make sure they embed themselves fully into the community, but we do that bit and Tassie takes care of the rest. It’s the most beautiful place to live.

“We haven’t had any trouble attracting players and I think they’ve all embraced the opportunity to play under Roth. That’s a bit of a conversation that shouldn’t really happen around AFL, because it’s a great place to live.”

The JackJumpers have now set the benchmark for success for expansion teams in sports across the nation, with their title triumph capping off a highly competitive first three seasons in the NBL.

Tasmania is the only team to have finished in the top four positions on the ladder in each of the past three seasons, and it’s one of just two teams to have competed in two separate Championship Series’ – the other being NBL22 and NBL23 champions Sydney.

The JackJumpers’ identity has been forged with the phrase ‘defend the island’, and Finnegan says it’s more than just a mantra.

“I think that whole ‘defend the island’ for us, has never been three words on the wall,” she said. “They’re something the club lives by and there’s something about Tassie that’s been overlooked on that national and international sporting stage, so when they go their NBL team they really embraced us and wrapped their arms around us, and equally we wrapped our arms around them.

“Defending the island has been very much defending that mantra of looking after the people of the island and we all live and breathe that.

“This club started in Covid from my dining room table in Brighton, Victoria. I’ll never forget that meeting, and we new we had nine or ten months to not only get a club up, but to actually build an arena or revamp an arena for them to play in.

“There was something about the opportunity where it didn’t matter what obstacle was put in our way, we just knew we could build something very special there and everybody that was there right from the start.

“I go back to those moments and think about it a lot, and it’s hard not to get excited or feel proud of what’s been achieved.”