Murray thriving thanks to Bullets opportunities

When Taine Murray joined the Brisbane Bullets for his rookie NBL season, he would have just been happy for any court time but instead he's an important member of the starting group, is given the biggest defensive assignments and the Kiwi is thriving.

Murray signed at the Bullets for NBL26 on the back of a standout college career at the University of Virginia, but even he couldn’t have imagined how far into the deep end through necessity he'd be thrown to start his NBL career.

The 23-year-old played just two minutes on debut back in the season-opening win in his home town against the New Zealand Breakers, but once Sam McDaniel injured his ankle early on in game No. 2 against the Cairns Taipans, that's when Murray's number was called.

Immediately in that game he was thrown the challenge of guarding Jack McVeigh and coach Stu Lash has continued to have tremendous faith in him to give him a lot of the toughest defensive assignments.

That was again the case on Saturday against Melbourne United at John Cain Arena with Murray given the job of chasing around 486-game veteran Chris Goulding.

He did a tremendous job as well limiting him to 13 points on 3/9 shooting while Murray had nine points, three assists, two rebounds and a steal himself while having a team-high +13 in the 33:30 of court time he had.

Murray now hasn’t played fewer than 23 minutes in any game since the first one of the season to be a crucial part of this Bullets team with him averaging 6.6 points and 2.0 rebounds a game while shooting at 57 per cent inside the arc and 39 per cent outside it.

He has very quickly made himself a valuable member of the Bullets particularly while Mitch Norton and Jacob Holt were out, and with Sam McDaniel and Tohi Smith-Milner, and Casey Prather now injured and Jaylen Adams having departed.

He is just thankful for the opportunities he has been given so early in his NBL career.

"I'm just grateful for my teammates and coaching staff, and obviously the belief they have in me to allow me to play high minutes like I am," Murray said.

"I think that is just allowing me to gain confidence for when we do get our whole squad back and then I think we can really make a push."

Murray is one of only two players who have hit the court in every game so far this season for the Bullets and he couldn't have been prouder with the fighting effort the team produced in Melbourne on Saturday.

After the dismal loss on the Gold Coast to the New Zealand Breakers on Wednesday where Prather got hurt and Adams was released afterwards, it was going to take some heart from the Bullets once they fell 21 points behind United.

They dug deep to put up a 39-point fourth quarter and get ever so close to what would have been a win for the ages with Murray proud to be part of a playing group that showed such fight.

"I'm super proud of how we are competing and coach Stu said don't come to practice on Friday if you don't think we can come and win, and we showed that belief we had," Murray said.

"We got down a little in those third and fourth quarters, but being able to comeback like we did shows that there's a huge belief in this team from the inside. We'll just keep working as hard as we can to keep pushing."

Considering everything the Bullets went through last week and then had to take on the league-leading United on the road to top it off, and then were 21 points behind in that game, it doesn't get a much tougher situation to be in.

However, what Murray has been impressed by since joining the Bullets has been how much of a connected unit the club is whether it starts with the front office with Mal Watts, the team headed up by coach Lash or the playing group with captain Norton.

"The group's been great through it all and I think that it's a credit to our leaders with Mal and coach Stu," Murray said.

"Obviously we felt for Casey, it's sad to see a brother go down like that especially with it being season-ending, and obviously Jaylen is our teammate first and we appreciate everything he did for us.

"Everything in terms of how we've handled it has been great and our leadership with Norto and Tyrell has been awesome, and they're really bringing us young guys along with them, and showing us how to navigate challenging times. Although it doesn’t really feel like that when you're in the moment."

Murray now can't wait to get back to the Brisbane Entertainment Centre this Thursday night for the Bullets' last game before the FIBA international break to show the home fans some effort they deserve to see from their team against the South East Melbourne Phoenix.

"We appreciate all the support that we do get from our fans and I hope it shows that through it all, we're obviously going to play as hard as we can and we all believe in what this club is about," Murray said.

"We're just trying to play as hard as we can and give our fans the best product we can."