The Hawks, as they are now known, have hit the membership target set by the NBL to see a viable commercial future in the region and allow the club to return Illawarra to its name.
The Hawks play their first home game at the WIN Entertainment Centre on Wednesday and with Hawks co-owner Dorry Kordahi confirming major sponsor Pepper Money purchased 1500 memberships to be used by the company’s customers and region’s high school students had put the club’s membership numbers over the 4,379 goals.
The number was set for the 43 years the foundation club has been in the league and 79, the year the NBL started.
Kordahi plans to meet with NBL executive chairman Larry Kestelman and chief executive Jeremy Loeliger this weekend to get the league’s blessing to return to their original name.
At the start of the season, the NBL was uncertain if the Illawarra region was a viable option to base the team after years of financial instability and part of taking ownership of the Hawks from previous owner Simon Stratford meant being open to the Hawks playing games outside of the Illawarra region.
The NBL had planned to expand the Hawks footprint by taking games to Canberra before the AIS Arena was shut due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
With the membership numbers now beyond the goal set by the NBL Kordahi is confident the ability to meet the membership target will ensure the league bosses’ endorsement.
“This is something we’ve worked really hard towards,” Kordahi said.
“We’ve seen a lot of corporate support and within the community to reach the target and we’re hopefully at the point where we can have the Illawarra name back.
“We’ve built this club back up from scratch, when we first we had to ask the NBL for basketballs so Sam Froling could come in to practice.
“But we always wanted the Illawarra name for the club and hopefully before Wednesday night we can have a huge crowd to be part of it.”
The Hawks went into liquidation at the end of Simon Stratford’s ownership, resulting in the NBL dumping the Illawarra name when the new owners – led by Kordahi, former Philadelphia 76ers general manager Bryan Colangelo and US businessman Michael Proctor – took charge.
Momentum has been growing as the team have started 4-0 behind new coach Brian Goorjian who himself gave an impassioned plea to the NBL and its fans to do whatever it takes to put the Illawarra back into the Hawks name.
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Goorjian, made it known even if he won every game and the title this season he feels his job would not be done without the NBL returning the Illawarra name.
Kordahi maintained the business model, given corporate sponsors have taken up memberships, would only be sustainable if fans put “bums on seats” throughout the season.