Tasmania JackJumpers Edge Phoenix in NBL Season Opener
The Tasmania JackJumpers opened their NBL27 campaign with a win, but it came wrapped in confusion, controversy and a rule book many in the building clearly didn’t know as well as they thought.
In front of a sold-out MyState Bank Arena, Tasmania overturned a 14-point halftime deficit to beat South East Melbourne Phoenix 96-91, then watched the final 30 seconds descend into a scene that will be replayed and debated across the league for days.
A game flips on a whistle – and a rule
Tasmania led 91-89 with 32 seconds left when Phoenix import D’Shawn Schwartz hounded Nick Marshall up the floor and ripped the ball free. It was the sort of defensive play that swings games and silences crowds.
Marshall then fouled to stop the break. After review, officials upgraded it to a disruptive foul under the new FIBA interpretations, handing Phoenix a golden chance: two free throws to tie, plus the ball.
This is where it all unraveled.
Schwartz had earned the foul. Instead, Skylar Mays walked straight to the stripe. No direction from the referees. No intervention from the Phoenix bench. Just an import guard doing what import guards have done for years in those moments — stepping up to take the biggest shots on the floor.
Under FIBA rules, he simply wasn’t allowed to.
The JackJumpers bench spotted it first. Head coach Scott Roth and forward Josh Bannan quickly alerted the officials that the wrong man was at the line. The referees huddled, checked the rule, and the mood in the arena shifted from tense to bewildered.
Under FIBA rule 45.4.3, if the wrong player attempts a free throw, that free throw is cancelled and possession flips to the opposition for a throw-in at the free-throw line extended. No redo. No second chance. No “our mistake, shoot them again.”
Because Mays went to the line of his own accord rather than being instructed there by the officials, the rule applied in full. The potential game-tying free throws vanished. So did Phoenix’s possession.
Tasmania ball. Two-point lead. Season opener on the island suddenly underlined in red.
“There’s a lot of confusion,” Phoenix head coach Josh King admitted afterwards. “I’ve never seen… I have to get some clarity behind it.
“I think the way I understood it, they said it was our ball. It was two shots and the ball I think?
“I think what Skylar thought is anybody could shoot because it was a unsportsmanlike foul and we got the ball back. But then when Skyler went to the line, it wiped out everything.”
There was no late safety net either. With no review mechanism available in the final two minutes to overturn the ruling, the decision stood. The rule book had the final say.
King, though, refused to pin the loss on the chaos.
“At the end of the day, that has nothing to do with the final result,” he said. “You don’t want to put your team in this situation where we have to rely on a play like that. So that’s not what decided the game at all.”
Roth declined to wade into the controversy post-game. His team had done enough damage over the previous 20 minutes.
JackJumpers’ shorthanded surge
For all the noise about the final sequence, the story of the night was Tasmania’s fight.
They trailed 52-38 at halftime. They were missing Josh Bannan, Ben Ayre, Anthony Drmic and Bryce Hamilton. The Phoenix bench, led by Angus Glover, had carved them up early. The home crowd had energy, but not much to cheer about.
Then the JackJumpers did what Roth-coached teams do. They tightened the screws.
Tasmania outscored Phoenix 58-39 in the second half, turning a flat opening into a trademark island surge. The defence that had been a step slow before the break suddenly swarmed. Passing lanes closed. Phoenix possessions grew longer, more frantic, less certain.
On the other end, import David Johnson took over.
Johnson was electric, pouring in 26 points to go with six rebounds and six assists. He shot 10-of-15 from the field, picking his spots, punishing switches, and refusing to let the game drift away when Phoenix still threatened to pull clear.
New guard Taran Armstrong, on debut, played with the poise of a veteran. He added 19 points, attacking gaps, getting downhill and giving Tasmania a secondary creator when Phoenix loaded up on Johnson.
Will Magnay, still on restricted minutes as he builds back, left his mark too. Fourteen points, four rebounds, six assists. Rim pressure, playmaking from the elbows, a physical presence that Phoenix never quite solved.
On the other side, Glover’s first-half barrage almost broke the game open. He finished with 21 points off the bench, a constant spark whenever King turned to him. Mays, at the heart of the late drama, delivered 18 points, six rebounds and two assists in a performance that deserved a cleaner ending than the rule-book tangle that will now follow him into the week.
A night that lingers
In the end, the JackJumpers walked off with a 96-91 win, a comeback that will satisfy Roth and a rule quirk that will keep coaches and players up at night re-reading the fine print.
The atmosphere at MyState Bank Arena told its own story. Relief. Confusion. Then a slow realisation that the officials had, in fact, applied the rule exactly as written, even if almost nobody in the building seemed ready for it.
Tasmania don’t have long to savour it. They fly north to face the Cairns Taipans on Wednesday, already needing to back up a high-intensity, emotionally charged opener with another road test.
Phoenix head home with more than just a loss to digest. They return to Melbourne to meet cross-town rivals Melbourne United at John Cain Arena on Thursday night, carrying a stinging reminder that in the modern NBL, understanding FIBA’s fine print can be just as important as making the right read out of a timeout.
