Cougars, Buccs enter National Finals as top seeds

On the back of their NBL1 West championship triumphs at RAC Arena on Saturday, both the Cockburn Cougars and Geraldton Buccaneers enter the NBL1 National Finals in Canberra as the top seeds.

The Cougars completed their perfect NBL1 West season on Saturday when beating the Warwick Senators 91-71 in the Grand Final at RAC Arena to now head to Canberra for the National Finals as the lone undefeated team in the country with a 23-0 record.

The Buccaneers, meanwhile, finished the men's regular season in second position with an 18-4 record and then ended up also beating Warwick 81-78 in Saturday night's Grand Final at RAC Arena to book their place in Canberra.

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On the back of what they both delivered in the NBL1 West seasons for 2025, Cockburn and Geraldton have now both been named as the No. 1 seeds for the National Finals that gets underway in Canberra on Friday.

It's also the second time for the Cougars and Buccaneers both to be competing in the National Finals when both were there back in 2023 at Arena Joondalup after their NBL1 West championship triumphs.

Only the quirks of the system meant the Buccs didn’t make the final on that occasion despite winning both their games while the Cougars might have still been in celebration mode for their couple of games after a maiden women's championship.

Cockburn and Geraldton also head to Canberra attempting to replicate what the Warwick Senators and Rockingham Flames did in Melbourne back in 2022 in claiming both national titles for Western Australia.

NBL1 South clubs the Waverley Falcons and Knox Raiders took both titles back to Victoria last year but the Raiders men won't be there to try and with three straight championships with the Illawarra Hawks from the NBL1 East instead taking their place.

The other competing teams on the women's side are the champions from the NBL1 North, Logan Thunder, along with the Woodville Warriors from NBL1 Central, Manly Warringah Sea Eagles from NBL1 East, the Knox Raiders from NBL1 South and then the Falcons rounding things out.

Up first for the Cougars on Friday will be playing the NBL1 Central champion Woodville Warriors with the game getting underway at 11:30am Perth time.

Championship winning Cougars captain Jewel Williams is looking forward to getting to Canberra and representing Cockburn and WA basketball proudly.

"There's been a lot of talk about who's going to play and who's not going to play, and there's lots of injuries and lots of WNBL players who might or might not be available so we will just have to wait and see when we get there," Williams told The Hoop Hour on 91.3 SportFM.

"We're definitely looking forward to it and it's a huge opportunity for us to test ourselves against the best teams from across the country.

"We're really pumped to get out there and the community's been part of this journey for us so we really want to go and do them justice and sort of show as well what WA basketball can do.

"We've always sort of been the underdogs over in the West so we want to go and play our style of game, and maybe even inspire more young people and young girls to get out there and give it a crack."

Then on the men's competition, Geraldton will be joined at the National Finals by the Canberra Gunners and Illawarra Hawks from NBL1 East, Southern Districts Spartans from NBL1 North, Sandringham Sabres from NBL1 South and West Adelaide Bearcats from NBL1 Central.

Geraldton will be playing the Bearcats first up on Friday with the game getting underway at 1:30pm Perth time.

Dayle Joseph is now a three-time NBL1 West Coach of the Year and a triple championship winning coach, and is looking forward to the experience while braving the cold Canberra weather.

"It's all a bit surreal still and I feel really proud of the group, and it's one of those things that I'll reflect on a little bit more down the track," Joseph said.

"I'm happy to get these next couple of games out of the way and I don’t know how much we're looking forward to getting into the minus three degrees in Canberra right now, so we might need to go and buy some more jackets before we head over.

"But we're looking forward to a couple more games with this group and representing Geraldton and the NBL1 West the best we can on the national stage."