Phoenix rise as Heartland standard shifts

Ever since Josh King first arrived at the South East Melbourne Phoenix, the standards have been raised.

The Heartland club opened the season 0-5 last season before King was brought in to replace Mike Kelly.

Since then, after securing a debut win in Launceston against the Tasmania JackJumpers 79-77, the Phoenix have gone 38-21.

That includes falling just one game short of the NBL25 Championship Series, losing 2-1 in last year’s Playoff Series to eventual champions Illawarra.

That momentum carried on into this season, with South East Melbourne producing their best ever regular season record (22-11), to finish the season in third (their highest ever mark).

The other key factor in the Phoenix’s turnaround has been the signing of Nathan Sobey from Brisbane, ahead of the 2025-26 season.

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The Victorian product has played his best basketball since arriving in the Heartland, illustrated by finishing equal third in this season’s MVP voting.

“Most games we go into now it’s like, ‘Phoenix should probably win this one’, so there’s a level of respect in the sense that people respect the way we’re doing things,” Sobey told CODE Sports.

“We’ve raised that expectation as a club and as a whole organisation and earned that credibility doing what we do consistently, day in, day out.”

Another key element to the team's success is its incredible depth.

“A few of those years in Adelaide we had a lot of depth, but I’m not sure about 12 guys, I actually don’t think that’s really ever been done like this,” Sobey said.

“It’s the strength of numbers, and that’s what this time of the year is built for. Hopefully we can go out ready to go, and use that as our advantage.”

Sobey’s Phoenix host Perth in the Seeding Qualifier from 7.30pm AEDT on Wednesday night, live on ESPN.

Read the full story here >> Coach Josh King’s bold call which helped transform South East Melbourne from NBL struggler to championship contender