an individual workout at Courtside Melbourne<\/a> on Wednesday afternoon after a full morning of United\u2019s training.<\/p>\nDaniels doesn\u2019t have to rush to the NBA as he will be eligible for the draft for several seasons starting from next year, but United coach Dean Vickerman warned fans to take their chance to see the young star play live while they can.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery game so far this year, we believe there\u2019s just been really, really good growth for Dash, and I thought it was a massive growth again tonight,\u201d Vickerman said.<\/p>\n
A further comparison could be drawn between Daniels\u2019 performance and that of Pelicans guard Jeremiah Fears, 18, who was the seventh pick in this year\u2019s draft and played his first minutes in their NBA line-up in this game.<\/p>\n
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Melbourne United\u2019s Dash Daniels strips the ball from New Orleans guard Jeremiah Fears.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Fears struggled with Daniels\u2019 defence and shot three of 15 from the field, finishing with seven points and five turnovers in 22 minutes. But Fears, who wears number 0 \u2013 as in \u201czero fears\u201d \u2013 was praised for his aggression by Green.<\/p>\n
So, if Fears was the seventh pick in this year\u2019s draft, it\u2019s not unreasonable to think Daniels \u2013 if his development continues this NBL season \u2013 could be a top-10 pick in next year\u2019s draft.<\/p>\n
NBA scouts rarely get to see draft nominees performing against NBA teams, so the footage of this game will likely push Daniels up the draft rankings. Fellow NBL Next Star Malique Lewis will get the same opportunity when his South East Melbourne Phoenix side plays the Pelicans at Rod Laver Arena on Sunday at 2pm.<\/p>\n
Zion gives Aussies a \u2018welcome to the NBA\u2019 moment<\/p>\n
Every rookie has their welcome to the NBA moment and Australian fans got theirs at Rod Laver Arena on Friday night.<\/p>\n
![\"Zion](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/48fd2d288f52930573a883a47313f2a6af790a30.jpeg\")
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Zion Williamson of the Pelicans drives to the basket.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n
Zion Williamson has provided newcomers plenty of them in his short career and the New Orleans Pelicans superstar gave Australia its introduction to live NBA action when he took flight and dunked home an alley-oop pass late in the first quarter.<\/p>\n
![\"Zion](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/aa86173a62876bdf202a96e918f27f68da24e611.jpeg\")
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Zion Williamson finishes an alley-oop dunk.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n
A capacity crowd of 14,880 filled Rod Laver Arena and roared their approval as the power forward finished a tidy pass from Saddiq Bey as his Pelicans handled NBL club Melbourne United 107-97 in the first NBA game in Australia.<\/p>\n
The Pelicans played the second unit for much of the second half and final quarter and United import Milton Doyle (25 points) had a three which could have brought his side within a point of their NBA opponents with three minutes to play, but it just missed.<\/p>\n
United put on a strong display and were praised by the Pelicans for their passing and organisation; United coach Dean Vickerman said he felt a duty to make an impression.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully, we\u2019ve done enough to say to the NBA \u201cit\u2019s worthy of bringing more teams back to Australia for these games,\u201d Vickerman said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was a responsibility that I felt tonight for the NBL and for Australian basketball to do a really good job on home soil and get other people that get an opportunity to play an NBA team.\u201d<\/p>\n
As expected, Williamson played 15 minutes, had 15 points and five assists and didn\u2019t return after half-time, he hopes to play a few more minutes in Sunday\u2019s game against the South East Melbourne Phoenix at RLA, but that will come down to his coaches as these are his first games of the new season.<\/p>\n
Fans chanted \u201cWe want Zion\u201d in the final minutes which drew a smile and laugh as the Pelicans reserves played out the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt great. Just when I got my second wind, I was done for the night,\u201d Williamson said. \u201cI\u2019ve been saying it a lot. I feel embraced, and I love it. I love it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Australians have lobbied the NBA for more than 15 years to bring a game Down Under from Luc Longley and Andrew Bogut to NBL owner Larry Kestelman, who successfully convinced the Pelicans to make history \u2013 and they will make some more of it when they finish their visit against South East Melbourne Phoenix at RLA on Sunday at 2pm.<\/p>\n
Loading<\/p>\n
The fans lucky enough to secure seats on Friday night got to see one of the NBA\u2019s best players in Williamson, they got to see potential all-star in Trey Murphy III (18 points in 18 minutes) and a spirited display from United who were playing without captain Chris Goulding and only had point guard Shea Ili for the first half before he was managed in the second half.<\/p>\n
The Pelicans were without star forward Herb Jones who hurt his left ankle at training on Thursday, Pelicans coach Willie Green wasn\u2019t sure if Jones could play on Sunday.<\/p>\n
But he was sure about how much his team enjoyed the experience.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was electric, the fans were in tune. They were engaged. It was really a great platform to come here and be able to play against high-level competition,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s fun getting out there playing in front of these fans.\u201d<\/p>\n
News, results and expert analysis from the weekend of sport are sent every Monday. Sign up for our Sport newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cTo have the opportunity to play against the Pelicans and them coming to Australia has been awesome, not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":189116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-189115","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/189116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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