Consistently Improving: Sobey’s Remarkable Rise to Stardom

Written for nbl.com.au by Tom Hersz

All-NBL Teams, MVP Finalist, Olympic Medallist. It’s fair to say Nathan Sobey has been at the top of his game the last couple of years.

But it wasn’t always that way. In fact, less than eight years ago, Sobey returned to Australia from playing collegiately in the United States and had no NBL offers. He’s had to work and fight for everything he’s earned at every stop along the way, and that makes his ascension to become one of Australia’s best players all the more impressive.

Growing up in the coastal Victorian town of Warrnambool, Sobey played a bunch of different sports. His mum got him involved in whatever was going on, but ultimately he was drawn to the two most popular sports in town – basketball and Aussie Rules football.

It was a way to have some fun, but also to hang out with his mates – most of whom preferred footy.

“It’s a different one,” Sobey told NBL Media on Saturday.

“I loved basketball, but then ultimately played footy with my mates and it was more fun doing that because all my mates went to footy. In Warrnambool, you’re either doing one or the other; it’s pretty hard to play both.

“Every one of my mates chose footy, so for me to have a social life I was more intrigued with playing football, just so I could hang out with those guys on the weekend.”

Despite that, it was basketball he enjoyed playing more and it came a little more naturally to him. Sobey fondly recalls heading down to the old YMCA and watching the local semi-pro team in the state league (Big V), the Warrnambool Seahawks. When he was young, they won back-to-back Big V (then VBL) championships led by star import Bobby Cunningham.

Sobey would find his way to the Seahawks senior team when he was 19 years old and from there, he got his first big break when his Seahawks coach helped get him a scholarship to Cochise; a junior college in Arizona.

It was there, in Sierra Vista, that Sobey finally realised basketball was a pathway to something bigger and began to dedicate himself to really getting better.

“I didn’t really fully start to head down that path of improving my game until I went to junior college to be honest,” he admitted.

“I did bits and pieces here and there before I went, but it wasn’t until I got to junior college and figured out that this is what I wanted to do, and the lifestyle I’d seen when I got to college and what it was going to take to be able to make something out of it. So, that was when I figured that out.”

Sobey had a standout sophomore year and then used that to transfer to the University of Wyoming – a Division 1 school in the Mountain West Conference. He played sparingly as a junior, but then started every game his senior year, busting out for 33 points in one game and having a solid season averaging just under 10 points per game.

In just four short years, he’d gone from playing in the Big V to scoring 33 points in a Division 1 NCAA game. Those years away at college really shaped Sobey as a player and he credits his coaches for putting him on the right path.

“Just working with professional coaches that have been on successful teams, especially at Wyoming with Coach [Larry] Shyatt, Coach [Allen] Edwards, Coach [Scott] Duncan,” Sobey explained.

“Those guys had been around the block and knew what it took to be good; not only just as an individual, but as a team and they showed me the right way to go about that and I just followed in the direction they were pointing me.

“They showed me the ropes of what it was going to take to not only just get better as an individual, but to make something more [of myself] than just college basketball, to try to become a pro out of it.”

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Big ups to the one and only Sobey Wan-Kenobi on taking out the Most Improved Player at <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL17MVP?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL17MVP</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/sobes2zero?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sobes2zero</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL17?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL17</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/YourGame?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#YourGame</a> <a href="https://t.co/Tm0YFgFQlB">pic.twitter.com/Tm0YFgFQlB</a></p>&mdash; The NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/831090630155595776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 13, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


Still, when Sobey returned to Australia, the NBL was not knocking on his door. He joined the Ballarat Miners in the SEABL (now NBL1 South) in 2014 and had a very strong season.

It showed that he may have a professional career ahead and at least one NBL coach agreed.

Aaron Fearne, then head coach of the Cairns Taipans had been following Sobey at Wyoming and keeping tabs on him. The two were in touch when Sobey was with Ballarat and Fearne wanted to give Sobey an opportunity to develop in an NBL environment.

Too old to be a development player by that stage, Fearne invited Sobey to be a training player with the Taipans if he was willing to move up to Cairns.

It was a risk. There was no guarantee he would get to play in any games unless someone got injured. Still, it was the chance that Sobey needed to prove he was able to compete at that level and he grabbed it. To this day, he’s extremely grateful for Fearne giving him a shot.

“Yeah, absolutely,” said Sobey.

“Fearney chatted with me at the end of my college career. He was great at communicating with me with that, and heading back to Ballarat, he was always chatting to me during that whole process.

“I’m very thankful and grateful for him to give me that opportunity to even get in an NBL organisation, whether it was training or whatever it was. Yeah, I’m definitely grateful for that.”

Sobey ended up playing in 10 games with Cairns, albeit sparingly, but that small sample size, as well as his work ethic during practice and individual workouts, was enough to get noticed.

Joey Wright caught some glimpses of Sobey working out after Taipans’ practice when his Adelaide 36ers were in town and took to the floor for shootaround. As Sobey was not part of the Taipans official roster, he was able to stay on the floor a little longer and Sobey thinks that helped Wright to understand what sort of player and worker Sobey was.

“I just think he saw a guy that wanted to get better,” Sobey explained of what Wright saw in him.

"Ultimately, he could see that I was a competitor by seeing some workouts that he would come into. So, he’d seen some things like that and I think most people would say Joey’s got a pretty good eye for finding talent that most people don’t see. He saw me that way and obviously gave me the chance with that deal to go down to Adelaide.”

Sobey finally had his shot at the NBL level. It took until his second year in Adelaide to establish himself as worthy of major minutes, helped by an injury to Mitch Creek, but once he got that opportunity, he did what he’d always done – he made the most of it.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Quick hands.<br>Quick feet.<br>Quick bucket.<br><br>That&#39;s <a href="https://twitter.com/sobes2zero?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sobes2zero</a>. <a href="https://t.co/BEqwax1hOF">pic.twitter.com/BEqwax1hOF</a></p>&mdash; Adelaide 36ers (@Adelaide36ers) <a href="https://twitter.com/Adelaide36ers/status/1076329523266826240?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 22, 2018</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


Only this time, Sobey exploded. He went from averaging four points in 10 minutes per game his first year with the 36ers, to starting 28 games, winning the Most Improved Player award and earning All-NBL Second Team honours in his second year.

Sobey had arrived. And while many were trying to figure out where this country kid from Warrnambool had been hiding, he wasn’t surprised at how well he played that year.

“I wouldn’t say I was surprised, no,” Sobey explained.

“The same sort of thing happened in Cairns. Corey Maynard goes down, I get the opportunity here and there. Brucey [Shaun Bruce] got sick one time and I got the opportunity to play a lot more minutes than I probably would have if those sort of things didn’t happen.

“And I just knew that the work I put in was going to come to fruition when I got an opportunity at a consistent basis. So, once I was able to get that consistent game time and platform to show what I can do, I think once Joey gave me that opportunity when Creeky went down, I just knew that it was my time.”

The rest is, as they say, history.

He’s been a star in the NBL ever since then, played a season in Europe, had a stint at NBA Summer League with the Utah Jazz, has made two more All-NBL teams including the first team last season when he was top three in MVP voting, and he’s become a staple in the Boomers program.

Sobey played a lot during the FIBA World Cup Qualifiers in 2017, 2018 and 2019, then made the final roster for the 2019 World Cup in China, before making history in Tokyo last year with the Boomers first ever Olympic medal.

When you think that just six years ago, Sobey was in his first season as a fully contracted NBL player, averaging just 10 minutes a game, his rise to where he is today is really a remarkable journey.

Does he ever stop to pinch himself?

“Not really,” he admitted.

“I reflect and understand what the process is doing. The little rewards you get along the way, you’ve got to just take those little rewards. That’s what makes it more fun in the end; knowing that what you’re doing, the work you’re putting in and the sacrifices you’re making, that there is a reward at the end of it.

“But ultimately, not a whole lot. I try to just live in the process and love doing what I’m doing and work on my game as much as I can. Obviously, when I sit back and reflect a little bit over the last five to six years, it’s been a pretty hectic time in terms of the places I’ve been to play. It’s pretty crazy once you look at it over that span.”

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The exclamation point ??<br><br>Sobey with the dime, Landale with the jam ?<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Tokyo2020?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Tokyo2020</a> | <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/7Olympics?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#7Olympics</a> <a href="https://t.co/bI5OfPRfAH">pic.twitter.com/bI5OfPRfAH</a></p>&mdash; 7Olympics (@7olympics) <a href="https://twitter.com/7olympics/status/1421408882572791809?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 31, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


Sobey, now 31 years old, ticked over 200 NBL games recently. For someone who wasn’t sure he’d ever get an NBL shot when he first returned from Wyoming, it’s quite an achievement. And while the milestone was nice, his focus is elsewhere right now.

“I’m pretty focused on what needs to be done to keep doing what I’m doing and to try to win an NBL championship, which is the one goal that I really want to get to,” explained Sobey.

“I’m pretty focused on that. I don’t really sit back and think about those other things too much.”

He is also focused on being a leader to his teammates, something that he’s embraced the last couple of years.

His move to the Bullets three years ago effectively gave him the keys to his own team and he’s established himself as the face of that team.

Sobey has also really evolved and matured his leadership style and his approach to being the one everyone turns to. He’s the one that needs to perform each night. The one that his teammates count on to set the tone of how they play; to inspire and carry them and to lead by example.

It’s a role he’s really enjoying.

“Yeah, I definitely enjoy it,” he said.

“You work to be in these sorts of situations, especially when you talk about the early days when it was completely different to what it is now.

“You love those sorts of roles and the pressures that come with it, I guess. And you just love to take those opportunities and I definitely love that and I enjoy being one of those guys for Brisbane, for sure.”

What Sobey is not enjoying right now is the inconsistency of the Bullets. It’s not new. In fact, it’s a narrative that has been around that team for a few years now. They have the talent, but they can’t put it together consistently enough to contend.

It is not something that Sobey shies away from in any sense.

“We can only really accept what it is,” he said honestly.

“And it’s simple, we have been inconsistent. That’s just the way it’s been. We’ve been right around the pack and shown how good we can be sometimes and then shown how poor we can be sometimes. But, it definitely doesn’t sit well.

“We definitely want to be that consistent team. Especially this year, I think we’ve got a great group that can be that team. We’re still fully figuring out what that looks like on a consistent basis and I think we’re trending in the right direction.

“But, we can talk about it as much as we want; we’ve got to be more about what we’re going to do on the floor each and every night and until we can prove that, it will just be the same sort of response from people. But, I definitely think we’ve got the group to change that.”

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">0 to 100 real quick.<a href="https://twitter.com/sobes2zero?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@sobes2zero</a> with the hoop and harm.<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBL22?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NBL22</a> live + free on <a href="https://twitter.com/10PeachAu?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@10PeachAu</a> + <a href="https://twitter.com/kayosports?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@kayosports</a> freebies ? <a href="https://t.co/96Ybpbgv1T">pic.twitter.com/96Ybpbgv1T</a></p>&mdash; The NBL (@NBL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NBL/status/1480030314235719681?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 9, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


Part of the change comes from the personnel. Sobey has some new teammates in Robert Franks, Isaiah Moss, Chaunxing Liu and Tom Digbeu, but the Bullets also have a new Head Coach for the first time since 2016.

James Duncan took over from Andrej Lemanis and while the results have not been good lately – the Bullets lost their fourth straight on Saturday – Sobey likes what ‘JD’ is doing with this group.

“Yeah, it’s been good,” he explained.

“There are obviously hiccups here and there, and things that are out of our control. But whether that’s what it is this year, there are always things like that during every season.

“But, JD’s been great. He came in and he’s really had a great energy with the group. Guys love him. It does take some time though. There’s a lot of different coaching styles; offence, defence and that’s just the way it is.

“We’ve proven how good it can be and we’ve just got to stick with it. But, JD’s been great for the group.”

Sobey is building a strong relationship with Duncan, but he’s also had some great coaches along the way that he credits for who he is as a player today. In fact, he’s taken something from each coach he’s played under. However, they’ve been not the biggest influence on his career.

“My family is the biggest one,” Sobey admitted.

“They’re number one when it comes to that. But all the people over the journey. My coaches in college, Coach [Jerry] Carillo, Coach Shyatt. And then Fearney, Joey, Drej’s a huge one.

“CJ’s [Bruton] probably – people don’t understand how much he helped me last year, so that’s another huge one. We have a really good relationship. I mean, Drej and CJ were huge for me in my move to Brisbane and trying to, I guess take my game to another level as well.

“And all my teammates over the years have helped me get better each and every day. But, for me, ultimately my family is number one with that.”

Speaking of family, Sobey’s has grown recently.

He and his wife had their second child last month and with two young kids at home, it has certainly changed his perspective on life – and on basketball – for the better.

“It’s the best,” he chuffed.  

“I really don’t know how to put it in any other words other than it really is the best thing. I love being a dad to my two kids. My little daughter’s at an age where she understands a fair bit more now and obviously my son’s only a newborn.

“Like you said, it has changed me and helped me on and off the court. When you have kids you figure out that basketball – yes you love to do it – but it definitely doesn’t come before the family and you can have a bad game or miss a few shots, whatever it is, and go home and they don’t understand that.

“So, I just have a better balance with life and basketball with my family for sure.”

Now Sobey, who missed last Saturday’s game with a minor injury, needs to help his team find a better balance on the court.

After their COVID layoff over Christmas and New Year’s, they had a couple of really good wins over South East Melbourne and Sydney, before these losses starting mounting.

Currently languishing in ninth place with a 4-7 record, they need to start putting it all together. Sobey – who is having a slightly down year this season – believes there is a lot of untapped upside in his team and doesn’t want to put a ceiling on how good they can be this year.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">ELITE VISION ? <br><br>Franks for 3 off the cross court pass from Sobey.<br><br>Watch live on <a href="https://twitter.com/ESPNAusNZ?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@espnausnz</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/kayo?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@kayo</a> <a href="https://t.co/wOxEbbdBFv">pic.twitter.com/wOxEbbdBFv</a></p>&mdash; Brisbane Bullets (@BrisbaneBullets) <a href="https://twitter.com/BrisbaneBullets/status/1486209121997438977?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 26, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>


Despite the losing record, he thinks they can still make a run. Obviously, consistency is needed but it also comes down to a better understanding of what it’s going to take to close games out.

“I said it early on. I think we’ve got the group that can get it done, but we’ve obviously got to be way more consistent,” Sobey acknowledged.

“We can’t just do it one week and then the next week be a different team. We’ve really just got to put it together each and every night.

“Once guys understand that what it takes to win in this league consistently is not easy – I mean if you don’t show up one night against whoever it may be, then it’s clearly not going to be your night.

“So, once we understand what it takes and how hard it is to win consistently, I think that’s when we’ll take the jump.”

Sobey put in the work and took the jump with his career. Now he’s trying to get his team to do the same.