BIO: Corey Maynard was born in Adelaide (SA) and began playing basketball as a junior with the Sturt basketball program. Maynard and his family moved to Melbourne when he was seven where he played his representative basketball for McKinnon Basketball Association from under 12s, leading numerous Cougar team’s in the Victorian Championship (VC) division within the Victorian Junior Basketball League (VJBL).

He was spent time playing with the Moorabbin Magic.

At age fifteen he moved back to Adelaide and attended Sacred Heart College where he also represented South Australia Metro in the Under 20 National Championships, where he led the team to the Gold Medal game against Vic Metro.

FAMILY: Maynard is the son of Peter and Donna Maynard, and has one brother, Brayden, and one sister, Karli.

His father, Peter, played eight games for Melbourne between 1980 and 1981 before playing 216 games in the SANFL with Glenelg and Woodville West-Torrens. His grandfather, Graham Campbell, played 151 games for Fitzroy and won the club’s 1957 best and fairest award. His brother, Brayden, currently plays in the AFL for Collingwood.

NBL EXPERIENCE

Corey Maynard made his NBL debut with the Cairns Taipans at 23 years of age. He went scoreless in his first NBL game.

On 29 April 2014, Maynard signed with the Cairns Taipans for the 2014/15 NBL season. After injuring his left thumb on 3 January 2015 against the Townsville Crocodiles, Maynard was ruled out for the majority of the season.

In 2015, Cairns become the first regional team to finish the season in first place (21-7) since Geelong achieved the feat in 1984. Cairns also achieved a NBL first when Aaron Fearne utilised the same starting five of Scottie Wilbekin, Cameron Gliddon, Stephen Weigh, captain Alex Loughton and Matt Burston for all 28 games.

The roster did see some change during the season however, with training player Nathan Sobey (1.5 points, 1.7 rebounds, and 0.1 assists) being elevated into the squad mid-season after injuries to Corey Maynard (1.1 points, 1.2 rebounds, and 0.6 assists) and Shaun Bruce (3.7 points, 1.5 rebounds, and 1.7 assists).

in the semifinals, they faced off against 4th seeded Perth and behind the all-around brilliance of Wilbekin (28 points, 10 rebounds, and 4 assists), who was unstoppable in their game one win (71-64). Wilbekin (16 points, 11 rebounds, and 6 assists)then led Cairns to victory in game two (80-68), progressing to the Grand Final series.

Maynard returned to the team in time for the Taipans’ semi-final matchup against the Perth Wildcats but Maynard had lost his spot in the lineup to 11th man Nathan Sobey and did not suit up for the team’s playoff games.

Cairns would face the New Zealand Breakers and, despite having home-court advantage, lost the opening game 86–71. A buzzer-beating fade away from Breakers forward Ekene Ibekwe resulted in a game two loss (83–81) and the Taipans missing out on winning their first NBL championship.

Wilbekin (15.2 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 4.3 assists) would lead the team in scoring and assists, as well as take home the club’s MVP award as Maynard finished the season with 1.1 points, 1.2 rebounds, and 0.6 assists per game.

2015/16
Front office changes and financial limitations saw the Crocodiles struggling to gain clarity on their future in the competition, resulting in player recruitment becoming extremely challenging for Townsville. The first impact of this saw Todd Blanchfield, who earned the NBL Most Improved Player the season prior, relocate to Melbourne and sign with the re-branded Melbourne United. Coach Shawn Dennis would sign Nicholas Kay, who was returning home after four years at Metro State College of Denver and then rounded out the rest of the roster by signing players happy to play for near league minimum contracts, mostly young talent unable to latch on with other team’s or veteran players other team’s had given up on. Luke Schenscher (via Adelaide), Corey Maynard and Mitchell Young (both via Cairns) were clear examples of that.

NBL MVP Brian Conklin was re-signed and appointed team captain and paired with incoming import Jordair Jett.

The season began with two consecutive losses to Melbourne United (84-99) at home and New Zealand (81-89) in New Zealand. But then, in surprising fashion, Townsville, who had won a total of three away games the previous season, defeated Sydney (80-77) and Perth (66-63) on their home floor in back-to-back rounds.

Townsville’s season quickly turned sour after that, highlighted by their 31-point defeat at the hands of Melbourne in late October and having the worst record in the league (2-9) after the first few months of the season. Then, when the team faced the Perth Wildcats at home, Conklin was involved in a ugly on-court incident involving Perth Wildcats guard Damian Martin Martin. During the fourth quarter of the Crocodiles win over the Wildcat’s (89–77), Conklin’s errant elbow collided with and broke Martin’s jaw. Despite a call from Australian basketball legend Andrew Gaze for Conklin to be suspended for at least six weeks, the NBL cleared Conklin of any wrongdoing. A similar situation arose during a brutal loss to Adelaide (65-89) less than two weeks after the Martin encounter, where Conklin (21 points and 12 rebounds) was in the spotlight again for another elbow incident, this time for striking 36ers forward Mitch Creek in a similar manner. He subsequently received a three-match suspension, with two of those games suspended for the rest of the season.

By the end of November, sitting at the bottom of the ladder (4–10), Townsville terminated Conklin’s contract due to what the club claimed was a number of ‘sub-par performances’. Conklin (13.5 points, 6.6 rebounds, and 1.6 assists per game) later took to social media to share his version of the truth, which pointed the finger at Townsville wanting to reduce costs as the reason for his release. The Crocs would bring in a former college teammate of Patty Mills, Omar Samhan (13 points, 8.9 rebounds, 1.6 assists, and 1.1 blocks), as Conklin’s replacement a week later.

Schenscher (4.1 points and 3.1 rebounds) also struggled with injuries and with nine games remaining, Townsville chose to add Harry Froling (1.6 points and 0.8 rebounds), a member of Townsville’s junior program, as an injury replacement player for him.

While Jett (15.3 points, 3.4 rebounds, 3.3 assists, and 1.1 steals) struggled in the team’s early games, he would explode during the second half of the season, leading the team in scoring with Mirko Djeric (5.3 points, 1.3 rebounds, and 0.9 assists) delivering his best season to date. With Townsville now firmly focused as a team, their work was rewarded in the second half of the season, winning half of their remaining games (7-7). This included a upset victory over Adelaide will go down in Townsville history as perhaps the most exciting finish to a game. The win showcased the fighting qualities instilled in the Crocs and even in the most unlikely circumstances, a team must play to the final buzzer.

In January, Maynard missed two games with an ankle injury, returning to action against the New Zealand Breakers (21 Jan). During the course of the season Maynard proved himself capable of running the offence, setting up his teammates, getting to the rim himself, hitting the outside shot, and playing strong defence. In 25 games for the Crocodile’s, he averaged 6.3 points, 2.8 rebounds, and 1.7 assists per game.

Despite again finishing with a winning record at home (8-6) but only three road wins for the season, Townsville would finish second last on the ladder (11-17) with Jett being awarded the Kevin Sugars Medal (club MVP).

Despite the hardships Townsville was viewed as overachievers for the most part and coach Shawn Dennis was rewarded by the league with the NBL’s coach of the year trophy. The Croc’s cleaned up on awards night with Nicholas Kay (10.8 points, 6.7 rebounds, and 1.3 assists) also winning Rookie of the Year and Clint Steindl (12.8 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 1.1 assists) earning Most Improved Player.

Although Townsville had a verbal commitment from the league they would be able to continue playing with their support, the inability to raise enough money from the community saw their eventual demise. Kay and Mitchell Norton (8.9 points, 2.7 rebounds, and 2.8 assists) both signed deals with Illawarra and while Young found a spot with Brisbane. Unable to find deals in Australia, Steindl and Djeric both ventured overseas, Luke Schenscher retired and coach Shawn Dennis would end up coaching in the Japanese national league.

After a successful basketball career in both the US college system and the NBL, Maynard switched codes to play in the AFL with the Melbourne Football Club. On 17 August 2016, Maynard signed with the Melbourne Football Club in the Australian Football League (AFL) as a category B rookie.

He would play three seasons in the AFL before announcing his retirement due to multiple injuries (August 2019).

Corey Maynard played two seasons in the NBL, playing for both the Cairns Taipans and the Townsville Crocodiles. He averaged 3.7 points, 2 rebounds, and 1.1 assists in 43 NBL games.

Dan Boyce (815 Posts)

Dan Boyce is a die-hard Sydney Kings fan who grew up in Melbourne during the roaring 90's of Australian Basketball and spent far too much time collecting Futera NBL Basketball cards.