National Finals | Starling the hero for Eagles

Featured image: Dan Cowley | @imagesby_dan

The Gold Coast Rollers put up quite a fight without most of their NBL1 North championship winning stars but Alex Starling came up huge with two massive shots late to deliver the NBL1 National Finals win for the Forestville Eagles 85-84.

Gold Coast stormed to the NBL1 North championship as the hottest scoring team in the country putting up 113.8 points a game including averaging 121.7 in the playoffs.

However, a lot of that was down to the firepower provided by Jensen Bradtke, James Whitt and Preston Le Gassick, but that trio have now gone into NBL mode at Melbourne United, Perth Wildcats and New Zealand Breakers respectively.

That left quite a job to do for coach Anthony Petrie, but he was up to the challenge as they took on the experience and quality of Forestville who were playing on their regular home court and having won the NBL1 Central two weeks earlier as well.

In those familiar surroundings and with a more settled line-up only missing Jordan Forbes from their championship triumph, Forestville got out to a flying start to be up by 12 early but Gold Coast then warmed to the task and were back within three by quarter-time.

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The Rollers then kept that momentum going to complete a 13-0 scoring run either side of quarter-time to open up their own nine-point lead, and then still being top at half-time 43-39.

Gold Coast then got back out to a seven-point edge in the third quarter but Forestville responded with an 11-0 run of their own only for the Rollers to maintain a 65-60 by three quarter-time.

The Rollers were back up seven early in the fourth quarter and then with 30 seconds to go, they were still up by four and the challenge was thrown back down to the hosts.

Alex Starling stepped up with a contested step back three which he made before ending up sprawled on the floor.

Gold Coast young gun Ashley McGrath then missed two free throws giving the Eagles last possession and Starling was trusted to make the play with the ball up top and guarded by Riley Oberman.

Starling dribbled to the foul line, pulled up for the jumper and it never looked like missing and put Forestville up one with 1.4 seconds to go.

Brodie McGregor couldn’t make his shot at the death despite getting a great look at a little one-handed push shot at the baseline.

It was a memorable win for Forestville to the delight of their home fans but it was quite the effort from Gold Coast who were missing the 68.5 points, 20.1 rebounds and 16.1 assists per game without Jensen Bradtke, Preston Le Gassick and James Whitt.

On top of the last five points of the game, Starling finished with 22 points and 13 rebounds on 3/5 three-point shooting after being Grand Final MVP two weeks ago for Forestville against the South Adelaide Panthers.

Greg Mays also had 26 points, eight rebounds and three steals, Adam Doyle 12 points, eight assists and three steals, and Daniel Johnson 10 points, eight rebounds and five assists.

Boston Mazlin ended up with 19 points, eight assists and seven rebounds for Gold Coast with 5/12 shooting from the outside with Ashley McGrath adding 17 points and four boards, and Cooper Urquhart 17 points and seven rebounds on 8/11 field goal shooting.

Brodie McGregor also had 13 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds, and Riley Oberman 12 points, 10 boards and four steals.

NBL1 NATIONALS FINALS 2026 | DAY 1

FORESTVILLE EAGLES 85 (Mays 26, Starling 22, Doyle 12)

GOLD COAST ROLLERS 84 (Mazlin 19, Urquhart 17, McGrath 17)