{"id":493961,"date":"2026-02-21T05:14:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T05:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/493961\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T05:14:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T05:14:12","slug":"could-two-time-champion-return-to-wildcats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/493961\/","title":{"rendered":"Could two-time champion return to Wildcats?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>He\u2019s long been rumoured to want to return to the Hungry Jack\u2019s NBL, but now it seems that Australian Boomer Nick Kay could be on his way back to the competition in the not-too-distant future.<\/p>\n<p>According to SEN WA\u2019s Tim Gossange, the 158-game NBL veteran is apparently nearing a return to the Perth Wildcats, with whom he won back-to-back titles in 2019 and 2020.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe will finish with the Wildcats, he will come back. He will play with the Wildcats,\u201d Gossange said on SEN WA.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s on too much money to come back right now, but he will finish his career in the NBL with the Perth Wildcats.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At the age of 33, Kay, who is currently playing with Japan\u2019s Shimane Susanoo Magic, is edging towards the tail end of his career, which also includes NBL stints with Townsville and Illawarra.<\/p>\n<p>Adding to the speculation, Wildcats coach John Rillie, who will coach Kay during the Boomers\u2019 upcoming FIBA Window, said, \u201cyour mail\u2019s correct this time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Heading into NBL27, the Wildcats had Kristian Doolittle, Dylan Windler, Jo Lual-Acuil Jr, Ben Henshall, Sunday Dech, Jaron Rillie, Noa Kouakou-Heugue, Cameron Huefner and Lat Mayan (club option) under contract.<\/p>\n<p>Perth finished the NBL26 regular season with a win over Adelaide on Friday night and will now face South East Melbourne in the Seeding Qualifier on Wednesday, March 4.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/696810544c3525aaec836c13_Disney+_1920x250_V1.jpg\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"He\u2019s long been rumoured to want to return to the Hungry Jack\u2019s NBL, but now it seems that&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":493962,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-493961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493961","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=493961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/493962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=493961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=493961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=493961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}