The Eagles claimed their first Men’s UBL title in front of a boisterous Team La Trobe home crowd at the La Trobe Sports Park Stadium on Thursday, defeating the University of Sydney in a see-sawing UBL Grand Final, 104 - 90.
The capturing of the Men’s UBL title means La Trobe University has become the first university to win all four major UniSport Australia Basketball National Championships on offer (across both Men and Women's competitions in the 5x5 format) and the most successful Australian university basketball program since the inception of the national championships model in 2018.
Going into the title decider as slight favourites by virtue of being the higher ranked team, the Eagles settled early with a positive start to lead by six at quarter time. Their dominance continued in the second quarter, as La Trobe’s fast-paced, offensive style of play continually picked apart the University of Sydney’s defence to generate plenty of scoring opportunities.
La Trobe’s big men Matt Debney (Bachelor of Education – Secondary - 21 points, 12 rebounds and pictured below right) and Lachie Vander Vorm (Bachelor of Business – Marketing - 26 points, 10 rebounds) in particular were causing headaches for the Lions in the first half, as the Eagles took a sizeable yet not insurmountable 17-point lead into the main break.
The half-time buffer would prove to be a handy one, as the University of Sydney roared back into the contest in the third term by upping their pressure and intensity to close the margin to just five points at the final change.
Their charge continued in the early part of the last quarter, with the Lions hitting the lead for the first time in the game and looked to have all the momentum. Down by five points with less than seven minutes to go, ripples of concern surged through the decidedly quieter Team La Trobe crowd, who had earlier been driving the home side with their energetic support.
With the game slipping away, La Trobe coach Randy Shanklin needed a lift from his key playmakers. Enter Nick Day (Bachelor of Teaching - 26 points, five rebounds) and Lorne Waldron (Bachelor of Education - 13 points, four rebounds), who took the game by the scruff of the neck with a series of clutch plays down the home stretch.
Day lifted the home crowd with a number of spectacular drives to the basket through traffic on the way to scoring 11 points in the final term, while Waldron (pictured below right) caught fire from deep at the most opportune time to sink a trio of three-pointers in the last. The heroics of the duo inspired the Eagles, who not only halted the Lions second-half onslaught, but in the end skipped away to a 14-point victory; a margin which wasn’t reflective of how nail-biting and tense the contest was between two high-quality basketball teams.
Speaking after the match, La Trobe Men’s Basketball captain Will Moio (Bachelor of Sport and Exercise Science) said securing La Trobe’s first Men’s UBL title was a culmination of hard work over a number of years.
“It’s a terrific feeling to win a the UBL Grand Final, especially after we feel like we’ve been building for the last couple seasons, so to get it done today is incredible,” Moio said.
“They (University of Sydney) certainly came at us hard in that third quarter and we knew they were going to as they are a very high-quality team, but it was great to see how we kept battling away and managed to grind out a victory in the end, so it’s an unbelievable feeling.”
As a member of the La Trobe Men’s Basketball program over the past three years and key driver of the Team La Trobe culture within the University’s wider representative sport program, Moio credits the University Basketball League as a major highlight in his student experience at La Trobe.
“UBL has been great for my uni experience; I’ve met some amazing people that I’ll be able to call lifelong friends, and I’ve had heaps of fun playing and competing in a sport I love whilst getting an education at the university level,” Moio said.
“I’d say to anyone to get involved (in Team La Trobe university sport programs) as much as possible and really buy in to it. It’s made my learning so much more enjoyable and helped me though my degrees, and I’ve now made some memories that I can look fondly upon forever and university sport has given that to me.”
With the Men’s University Basketball League National Championship now added to the trophy cabinet, La Trobe University is now the current holder of three of the four UniSport Australia National 5x5 Basketball Championship titles (2024 Men’s UBL National Championship, 2023 Men’s Uni Nationals Division 1 Gold Medal and 2023 Women’s Uni National Division 1 Gold Medal) and winner of six of the past 10 national titles that have been on offer during the past three years.
Much of the success over that period has been down to La Trobe University’s Women’s Basketball team, who also competed in the 2024 University Basketball League Grand Final against University of Sydney on Wednesday.
Unfortunately for the La Trobe girls, their quest for three Women’s UBL National Championships on the trot was thwarted by the University of Sydney, who the Eagles defeated in the 2022 and 2023 UBL Grand Finals.
Playing in front of their home crowd in Sydney, the Lionesses burst out of the blocks early in the first and didn’t let up for the entire game in an impressive display. La Trobe were valiant throughout the game and made a late charge on the back of strong performances from Anna Burrows (Bachelor of Commerce/Science - 19 points, seven rebounds), Hayley Sparks (Bachelor of Business - 11 points, eight rebounds) and Piper Dunlop (Bachelor of Exercise Science - nine points, 13 rebounds), but in the end they went down 81 – 62.
The La Trobe Men’s & Women’s Basketball teams will now turn their attention to defending their respective Uni Nationals Division 1 crowns at the 2024 UniSport Australia Nationals in Canberra in September.
To view game highlights and full game replays from both the Men’s and Women’s UBL Grand Finals, visit the UniSport TV website. To view the image gallery of the Men’s UBL Grand Final at the Sports Park Stadium, head to La Trobe Sport’s Facebook and Instagram channels.
