Golden fit at JackJumpers for Big Ben

Ben Gold wanted to start his professional career at the Tasmania JackJumpers because he thought it'd be the best environment for him, and already five games in and he's making a significant impact with the NBL ladder leaders.

The JackJumpers that they had a tremendous front court trio coming back from last year into NBL27 with Will Magnay, Josh Bannan and Majok Deng, but also were fully aware that they needed to add some depth to that group.

That's already been proven the case over the opening month of the season with Bannan missing the start with a rib injury and Deng currently sidelined with a fractured leg.

So the mission was to find another big that could make that a tremendous foursome, but could also step up in the absence of any others and that's where Gold quickly became a key target.

The Kiwi big man had a strong college career at Marquette University finishing off with 8.0 points and 5.8 rebounds in his senior season, and now he has made an impressive start to his NBL career with the JackJumpers.

Gold made an immediate impact on debut with five points, four rebounds and three blocks in the win over the South East Melbourne Phoenix, and then this past Friday night in Wollongong, he delivered his best NBL performance.

He finished with 14 points and three rebounds on 3/4 three-point shooting in the win against the Illawarra Hawks that now sees Tasmania sit on top of the NBL after four rounds with a 4-1 record.

Following that win against the Hawks, Gold was happy to contribute but he was far from the only JackJumpers player to shine as they set a new franchise record by putting 122 points on the board.

"It's a lot of fun when things are going your way and to start the season I've had games that were the opposite especially the last game, and it's just sticking with it and seeing it through," Gold said.

"Coach and everyone else gives me confidence to go out there every single day and lay my body on the line, and play for the team, and at the end of the day that's all that matters."

At no point this season have the JackJumpers played a game close to being at full strength, and again on Saturday night against Illawarra, the newly retired Anthony Drmic, Ben Ayre, Bryce Hamilton and Deng remained out.

But that doesn’t matter to the JackJumpers because it's all about just worrying about who is out there and David Johnson had 32 points in under 18 minutes, Bannan delivered 25 points, seven rebounds and four assists, and Magnay nearly had a triple double with 14 points, nine boards and eight assists.

That's what Gold enjoys so much about being part of this team already is how they're never looking for excuses, and just worry about what needs to be done.

"We talk about it as a team having that next man up mentality and any night it can be anyone's game," Gold said.

"In this one, DJ had 32 but we needed everyone else to do their job too so you're not necessarily with us going to see the same one person dominating the scoreboard.

"We're a deep team and we have a lot of players that play for each other, and everyone gets open shots and open looks. That's why it's so fun to play for us."

Gold had no shortage of options for where to play professionally after he finished at Marquette, not just in the NBL, but across the world.

But when he looked into the culture built at the JackJumpers and the way everyone within the club conducts themselves on and off the court, he immediately knew that was an environment he wanted to be part of.

"That was a big thing when I was deciding on where to go and everyone kinda looks at how you'll fit in as a player, and on the court stuff," Gold said.

"But one of the things that really stuck with me was the values and how everyone goes about the business here on the team.

"Everyone's bought in, everyone has the same mindset and everyone has that underdog chip to them where they just go out there to do what they need to do every single game.

"No one's going out there to get their game off or look for their individual accomplishments and stats, at the end of the day we all just wanna win a game."

The other thing that stood out to Gold when he looked at the JackJumpers was how much better he'd immediately getting just by practicing with, and against, a front court of Magnay, Deng and Bannan every day.

Not only that, but then he could see how tough of a combination they could be together on the court, but also he knew that if he was going to learn off three professional bigs, he was going to find it tough to come across a better trio.

"That was obviously a big thing for me coming to a team you always want to make sure you're getting better and that you're challenging yourself every single day," Gold said.

"That's what I think we do really well as the Jackies is the development side of things and being able to match up whether it's against Bannan, Jook or Mags, if you're pushing yourself and are committed to it you're going to get better every day.

"That's on the court and off the court that they've helped me a lot through these first three, four months that I've been here.

"It's good to be able to look up to them and have them help me every day, and they know how to get their message across whether it's different from each of them. It's been really beneficial."

Then there's also the chance by joining the JackJumpers to play under coach Scott Roth and Gold couldn’t hide how much he's already enjoying it even if he was sitting right next to him at the time.

"It's a lot of fun and he lets you have fun out there. He allows you to go out there and play to your style, and he's not going to drag you or pull you out for going outside of your box necessarily," Gold said.

"He allows you to go out there and play as a team, he encourages you to be aggressive. Like in this game I knocked down a couple of shots early on, and him and the rest of the coaching have been building that confidence in me to keep being aggressive and look for my shots.

"That's not always just on the offensive end, but on the small things on the defensive end too which helps me build my confidence."