Melbourne United star Matthew Dellavedova is shooting for Los Angeles 2028.
The NBA championship winner will be almost 38 when the next Olympics begin and the Boomers need to secure a spot through the FIBA World Cup in Qatar in 2027, another tournament he desperately wants to play in.
Australian basketballer Matthew Dellavedova is aiming to remain in the national team for Los Angeles 2028.Credit: Getty Images, AP
But it’s not just the Maryborough boy’s trademark hustle that will fuel his drive for LA – it’s the results from almost a decade of physical testing that still ranks highly with current NBA players.
While Brian Goorjian’s decision to cut him from the Boomers for last year’s FIBA World Cup was seen as the motivation for his success in the past year, Dellavedova said it was also the result of having a run without a long-term injury and a fine-tuned program of weights, diet and sunshine.
He was also buoyed by physical testing at San Francisco-based training group P3, which he has been visiting since before his rookie NBA season with Cleveland.
Even before Dellavedova shocked many critics by winning a recall to the Boomers for Paris 2024, where he performed his usual determined role off the bench, he set his sights on chasing a place at the next Olympics.
Melbourne United’s Matthew Dellavedova drives to the basket against Adelaide.Credit: Getty Images
Should he make the LA team, he would join Andrew Gaze, Lauren Jackson and long-time teammates Patty Mills and Joe Ingles as a five-time Olympian.
“That’s the fun part of me – I still feel like there is room for improvement,” Dellavedova said on the eve of Paris 2024.
“I still feel I can go to another level and some of the games I had this season were some of the best I’ve played in my career.
“My goal after this Olympics is to make the next World Cup and Olympics.”
Matthew Dellavedova, pictured at Paris 2024, is determined to push himself to the 2028 Olympics.Credit: AP
Basketballers have always focused on vertical testing, such as how high can you jump, or how fast you can get up the court but P3’s motion-capture testing focuses on lateral movement and that is becoming increasingly important as players need to explode into space or defensively keep in front of opponents.
“Delly has always been pretty close to maximising his athletic capabilities and making the most of what he has but here he was, 10 years into his professional career, putting up more lateral force than we have ever seen from him,” P3 general manager Adam Hewitt said.
“Some of his lateral stuff looked really good, he was up there with the best NBA athletes.”
Dellavedova last visited P3 in 2023 and set new personal bests in several tests.
“You look at his data and his net lateral force is in the 76th percentile of NBA players – that’s a really good look,” Hewitt said.
“His hip extension velocity – which is a very granular number, but our best movers have this quality – he’s in the 96th percentile [of NBA players].
“The things that let you move around the court really well are the things he does really well – he’s never going to win a dunk contest, but he expresses this by moving around the court really efficiently.
“Most NBA players we see are at their best when they are really young but most don’t have the work ethic and analytical approach that Delly does.”
Matthew Dellavedova of the Australian Boomers.Credit: Getty Images
Dellavedova plans to head back to P3 and beat those numbers next year.
“Having Adam break it down, seeing that cold, hard data unlocks your mind and reminds you that age is just a number, and you don’t have to get less athletic as you get older,” Dellavedova said.
Delly’s diet, which some in his inner circle describe as a “caveman diet”, features breakfasts of avocado, eggs and toast while lunches and dinners consist of plenty of steak plus a few serves of oysters with protein shakes throughout the day.
He keeps carbohydrates for before times of heavy exertion, such as major training days.
“Diet is personal for everyone, and you have to keep experimenting,” Dellavedova said. “I feel lighter, but I’m also getting stronger so that reduces the strain on my joints.”
Grounding (walking barefoot on grass or sand) and getting as much sun as he can get without getting sunburnt is another key part of his regime.
Dellavedova works closely with his trainer Paul McCoy, a former St Mary’s teammate, and Paul McCoy, whose efforts he says are vital to keeping him at his best. As are those of his preschool-aged son Anders.
“Last off-season he would just be riding his scooter, watching a little bit and having some snacks but this off-season, he still had his scooter, but he had his little ball and was watching a little more closely,” Dellavedova said.
“We would play a few little games after I’m finished. It’s cool when they get more and more involved.”
Melbourne United are in lockstep with Dellavedova’s goal.
“No one at our club is ever going to say to him that he can’t reach that goal as he continues to prove everybody wrong his whole career – it is what keeps him sharp,” United coach Dean Vickerman said.
“How can we help? We will keep believing in him and helping his body stay at a level that in four years he is good enough to go do that.”
As Dellavedova watches his contemporaries extend their primes, he plans to do the same.
“Seeing LeBron James and Steph Curry playing at such a high level, seeing Lauren Jackson in the WNBL finals and Scotty Pendlebury still playing such good footy for the Pies – there’s no reason why you can’t do something, you don’t want to put any limits on yourself or in your mind.”
