2019–20 NBL season

Nine teams competed in the 2019–20 Season with the addition of South East Melbourne Phoenix.[2]

Breakers Bullets Hawks Kings Taipans United Wildcats 36ers Phoenix

Team	Location	Coach	Captain	Stadium	Capacity	Founded	Main Sponsor
Adelaide 36ers	Adelaide	Joey Wright	Brendan Teys Kevin White	Adelaide Entertainment Centre	11,300	1982	Scouts Australia
Brisbane Bullets	Brisbane	Andrej Lemanis	Rotating captaincy	Nissan Arena	5,000	1979	Tyrepower
Cairns Taipans	Cairns	Mike Kelly	Nathan Jawai D. J. Newbill	Cairns Convention Centre	5,300	1999	CQUniversity
Illawarra Hawks	Wollongong	Matt Flinn	David Andersen Todd Blanchfield	WIN Entertainment Centre	6,000	1979	SLAM Media Inc.
				AIS Arena	5,200
Melbourne United	Melbourne	Dean Vickerman	Chris Goulding	Melbourne Arena	10,500	1984	SodaStream
New Zealand Breakers	Auckland	Dan Shamir	Thomas Abercrombie	Spark Arena	9,300	2003	Sky Sport
				Eventfinda Stadium	4,400
				ILT Stadium Southland	4,000
Perth Wildcats	Perth	Trevor Gleeson	Damian Martin	Perth Arena	14,800	1982	Pentanet
South East Melbourne Phoenix	Melbourne	Simon Mitchell	Mitch Creek Adam Gibson	Melbourne Arena	10,500	2019	Dreamstreet Lending
				State Basketball Centre	3,200
Sydney Kings	Sydney	Will Weaver	Kevin Lisch	Qudos Bank Arena	18,200	1988	HOSTPLUS

The pre-season games started on 19 June 2019 and ended on 16 October 2019. The pre-season featured games in China, the Philippines and the United States, and featured the NBLxNBA 2019 Tour in which five NBL teams played a total of seven games.

Ladder

2019-20 NBL pre-season ladder
Ladder	Information
Pos. Nat. Name Pld. W. L. Last 5 Streak Home Away For Against Pts % Win % 1 Sydney Kings 5 4 1 4-1 W3 1-0 3-1 486 394 123.35% 80.00% 2 Cairns Taipans 9 6 3 4-1 W4 3-1 3-2 811 763 106.29% 66.67% 3 SEM Phoenix (NT) 9 6 3 4-1 W2 3-2 3-1 819 784 104.46% 66.67% 4 Melbourne United 12 6 6 2-3 L2 4-3 2-3 1167 1095 106.58% 50.00% 5 Brisbane Bullets 8 4 4 3-2 W3 1-1 3-3 676 676 100.00% 50.00% 6 Illawarra Hawks 6 3 3 2-3 L2 1-1 2-2 598 631 94.77% 50.00% 7 Adelaide 36ers 10 4 6 1-4 L2 1-1 3-5 892 920 96.96% 40.00% 8 Perth Wildcats (RC) 7 2 5 1-4 L1 1-2 1-3 625 671 93.14% 28.57% 9 NZ Breakers 6 1 5 0-5 L5 0-0 1-5 501 574 87.28% 16.67%	Total Rounds 11 weeks Total Games 46 games Legend (NT) New Team (RC) Reigning Champion Updated: 17 October 2019

NBL Blitz ladder

2019 NBL Blitz ladder
Ladder	Information
Pos. Nat. Name Pld. W. L. Qtr Won Last 5 Streak For Against Pts % Win % Pts. 1 Brisbane Bullets 2 2 0 6.5 2-0 W2 198 142 139.44% 100.00% 12.5 2 Cairns Taipans 2 2 0 5 2-0 W2 187 167 111.98% 100.00% 11 3 South East Melbourne Phoenix (NT) 2 2 0 5 2-0 W2 198 182 108.79% 100.00% 11 4 Sydney Kings 2 1 1 5 1-1 W1 190 167 113.77% 50.00% 8 5 New Zealand Breakers 2 1 1 5 1-1 L1 192 178 107.87% 50.00% 8 6 Melbourne United 2 1 1 5 1-1 W1 186 188 98.94% 50.00% 8 7 Illawarra Hawks 2 1 1 1.5 1-1 L1 213 229 93.01% 50.00% 4.5 8 Adelaide 36ers (RC) 2 0 2 3.5 0-2 L2 184 192 95.83% 0.00% 3.5 9 Perth Wildcats 2 0 2 2.5 0-2 L2 190 225 84.44% 0.00% 2.5 10 NBL1 All Stars (NT) 2 0 2 1 0-2 L2 125 193 64.77% 0.00% 1	Total Rounds 4 days Games per Team 2 Total Games 10 Legend (NT) New Team (RC) Reigning Champion Updated: 22 September 2019

The 2019–20 regular season took place over 20 rounds between 3 October 2019 and 16 February 2020.

Ladder

2019-20 NBL ladder
Ladder	Information
Pos. Nat. Name Pld. W. L. Last 5 Streak Home Away For Against Pts % Win % 1 Sydney Kings 28 20 8 4-1 W2 12-2 8-6 2642 2472 106.88% 71.43% 2 Perth Wildcats (RC) 28 19 9 4-1 W3 11-3 8-6 2529 2409 104.98% 67.86% 3 Cairns Taipans 28 16 12 3-2 L2 11-3 5-9 2587 2547 101.57% 57.14% 4 Melbourne United 28 15 13 4-1 W3 9-5 6-8 2638 2560 103.05% 53.57% 5 Brisbane Bullets 28 15 13 3-2 W1 10-4 5-9 2607 2557 101.96% 53.57% 6 NZ Breakers 28 15 13 4-1 W4 9-5 6-8 2514 2468 101.86% 53.57% 7 Adelaide 36ers 28 12 16 1-4 L2 8-6 4-10 2654 2768 95.88% 42.86% 8 SEM Phoenix (NT) 28 9 19 0-5 L8 6-8 3-11 2671 2761 96.74% 32.14% 9 Illawarra Hawks 28 5 23 0-5 L10 3-11 2-12 2354 2654 88.70% 17.86%	Total Rounds 20 Games per Team 28 Total Games 126 Legend (NT) New Team (RC) Reigning Champion Updated: 16 February 2020[3]

The NBL tie-breaker system as outlined in the NBL Rules and Regulations states that in the case of an identical win-loss record, the overall points percentage between the teams will determine order of seeding.

¹Melbourne United won on overall points percentage. Brisbane Bullets finished 5th on overall points percentage.

The 2019–20 Finals were played in February and March 2020, consisting of two best-of-three semi-final series and a best-of-five Grand Final series.[4] In the semi-finals, the higher seed hosted the first and third games. In the Grand Final, the higher seed hosts the first, third and fifth games.

Despite the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic and multiple other sporting events being cancelled due to the pandemic, the Grand Final series started on 8 March 2020. Before Game 2 it was decided that the remaining games would be played without crowds, however Games 4 and 5 were later cancelled.[5][6] The Perth Wildcats were named champions of the season, after they built a 2–1 lead in the series before it was cancelled.[7]

Australian Broadcast Rights to the 2019–20 season were held by SBS Viceland in the first year of a two-year deal. All 126 games were available live and free on streaming platforms such as SBS On Demand. ESPN also broadcast 59 games including all games after 7.30pm AEDT.[8] In New Zealand, Sky Sport were the official league broadcaster.[9] The NBL also became the first Australian sports body to broadcast their matches online with them signing a two-year deal with Twitch which included all pre-season games.[10] The NBL also signed a deal with Facebook Watch, which broadcast 52 games across the season in the United States.[11]