Basketball Tryouts in Victoria: What Actually Happens

Where every association is up to, 11 October 2026

This is the state of play for Under 12 to Under 18 when we read every association's official tryout page on Sunday 11 October 2026. Most were running their final sessions that weekend, and the first teams were already going out: Nunawading planned to start sending selections on Saturday 10 October, and Camberwell posted its girls' teams on 11 October.

Dates and deadlines in the table are copied from each club's own page, handbook or schedule. Where a club has not published something, the table says so rather than guessing. If an email from your club says something different, follow the email.

Under 20 tryouts run later. When we checked, they ran from Thursday 8 October at Melbourne Tigers to Sunday 22 November at Geelong United, so an Under 20 player may still be trialling after the younger teams are named.

When the offer comes

Offers move fast, and the window to answer is short. Melbourne Tigers, Basketball Hawthorn, Darebin and Dandenong all give 24 hours to respond. Sunbury and Mornington give 48 hours. Several clubs say an offer that is not answered in time can be withdrawn and passed to another player, so watch your email and phone in the days after the last session.

Most clubs want money at the point of acceptance. Deposits we found range from $50 at McKinnon to $650 at Darebin. Some clubs want the full fee straight away: Nunawading's $690 is due by 7:00pm Monday 12 October, Doncaster's $725 by 5pm the same day, and Melbourne Tigers ask for all fees at the time of accepting.

Deposits are usually not refundable. Mornington's $200, Ringwood's $100 and McKinnon's $50 deposits are all described as non-refundable, and Darebin says no refunds are issued once a player accepts. Read the club's terms before you pay, not after.

Saying no has consequences too. Melbourne Tigers say a player who declines an offer is no longer eligible to play for Melbourne Tigers, and Dandenong say a player who declines cannot play or train for any other Rangers team that season.

Some clubs treat the tryout itself as a commitment. Nunawading says players who progress beyond the final stage are confirming they intend to accept if selected. Darebin says attending its session on Tuesday 6 October committed a player to its program, with no Permission to Train requests from that date.

Once accepted, things start quickly. Nunawading training began on Sunday 11 October, Mornington's first training is Sunday 18 October, and Sunbury's first weekly sessions run 20 to 22 October. Basketball Victoria's 2026/27 handbook says VJBL games start on 20 November 2026 and run through to 17 September 2027.

When tryouts happen, and why parents miss them

Tryouts for the 2026/27 VJBL season were held in October 2026, with most associations running their sessions across the first three weeks of October and new to rep or pre-tryout sessions in August and September. Registrations generally open the month before.

This is the fact Victorian basketball parents miss most often, and it is worth stating bluntly. The championship rounds do not start until March, so people assume they can sort a rep spot out early in the year. By then the squads have been picked, trained together and played their grading games, which for 2026/27 start on 20 November. October is the door, and it is only open once.

There is no single statewide tryout. Every association runs its own, sets its own dates, books its own venue and takes its own registrations. Basketball Victoria maintains a page listing association tryouts, but it is compiled from what associations submit and when we checked on 11 October 2026 it still carried 2025 entries. Check the association's own site and their socials, and if the date matters to you, ring them.

What actually happens on the night

Most associations ran three or four sessions per age group for 2026/27, and some ran five or six. Expect to attend all of them. Waverley says athletes are required to attend all tryout sessions and that missing sessions may affect selection, and most clubs read a missed session the same way.

The format is fairly consistent. Some warm up and movement work, then drills that let coaches see footwork, hands and decision making, then a long stretch of small sided games and full court play. The games are where the decisions get made. Drills show a coach what a player can do. Games show them what a player actually does.

Numbers are called out or pinned on. Coaches stand at the side with a clipboard and say very little to the kids. That silence is not a verdict, it is just what assessing forty players in ninety minutes looks like.

The later sessions are often by invitation. After each round, clubs tell players whether they have progressed, by email or by posting numbered lists on their website, and most name teams within a few days of the final session, by email, by phone or on the club website. See the table above for your association.

What coaches are actually looking for

This is the part parents get most wrong, so here is the honest version from the other side of the clipboard.

Nobody is counting points. A kid who takes fifteen shots at a tryout is easy to select against. What gets written down is whether a player moves without the ball, whether they talk on defence, whether they go after a loose ball, whether their first thought with the ball is a good one, and whether they are still competing in the last five minutes.

Coachability gets weighted more heavily than anything technical at the younger age groups. If a coach corrects something and the player changes it in the next possession, that goes in the book. If they do the same thing again three times, that goes in the book too.

Height and speed obviously get noticed. They are also the two things a player cannot do much about in the six weeks before a tryout, which is exactly why they are the wrong things to worry about.

How to prepare, and what not to bother with

The work that shows up at a tryout is the work done in the months before it, not the week before it. Cramming does not transfer. A player who has been getting up shots and handling the ball consistently since winter will look different in October, and there is no shortcut to that.

In the fortnight before, back off rather than pile on. Sharp and fresh beats tired and overworked. Get sleep sorted, get the shoes worn in, and go and play.

On the day: arrive early, warm up properly rather than standing around, and know your number. Parents, sit up the back and let the coaches coach. A parent shouting instructions from the sideline is noticed, and never in a good way.

If your child is nervous, the useful thing to tell them is that they are being assessed over several hours across several sessions, not on any one possession. One bad turnover in the first ten minutes decides nothing.

If your child does not get picked

Plenty of very good players get cut, and at Under 12 and Under 14 the reasons are frequently developmental rather than about ability. Kids grow at different times. A squad that looks settled at twelve rarely looks the same at sixteen.

Domestic basketball is not a consolation prize. It is a full competition with real coaching, and a player who spends a season getting big minutes and touching the ball constantly often develops faster than one sitting on a rep bench.

The other option worth knowing is that some associations run development or academy programs alongside their rep squads, and the Regional League tier added to the VJBL in 2026 sits below the Victorian Junior League divisions with travel deliberately reduced. Ask the association what exists between domestic and their top squad, because the answer is rarely nothing.

And tryouts come round every October. A player who misses out at twelve and keeps working is not out of the pathway. They are a year away from the next door.

We have a full page on what to do in the first few days, how the different clubs handle feedback, and the waiting lists, train-on places and development leagues that exist for players who miss out.