Lauren Jackson signs with Albury-Wodonga Bandits for 2024 NBL1 East season

The 42-year-old, who is widely considered as Australia's greatest-ever basketball player, returns to her home club after helping the Bandits to its first women's championship in 2022.

"It's phenomenal for the area and it's phenomenal for basketball, not just here, but Australia and worldwide to have someone of Lauren's stature going around again," newly appointed Bandits' coach Sam McDonald said.

"There's a lot of stuff behind closed doors that people don't see that Lauren brings.

"She's a natural born leader and she's done that for all of her career.

"The advice and guidance that she provides to the younger players coming through is invaluable, you can't put a price on that."

It comes just a week after it was announced Jackson would once again be playing for Southside Flyers in the upcoming WNBL season.

McDonald is confident Jackson will available for as many NBL1 East games as possible next season.

"I'm saying yes, and that's probably more Lauren saying yes, because she just doesn't want to miss a game," he said.

"You saw it last year, she played through a broken foot.

"Her desire is to come back and play with the Bandits for as many games as she physically can and that she can with her work commitments and really push towards getting us to the top yet again, which would be fantastic for basketball in Albury-Wodonga."

After coming out of retirement to make her incredible comeback for the Opals at the World Cup last year, Jackson has recently had to fight back from an Achilles injury.

"As soon as the injury happened, Lauren battled through being in two moon boots for six weeks and was then straight back into it," McDonald said.

"I remember it was May and we were out here and she wanted to get shots up as soon as she was allowed to.

"She's in fantastic shape."

Jackson has previously praised McDonald for assisting her in her comeback journey and advocated for him to take on the role with the Bandits, with the pair also good friends.

"It's great to have the support of a very close friend in Lauren," he said.

"It's 40 years of the Bandits next year and we spent a lot of our time sitting just down there watching all the games.

"To be able to go full circle like that, it's awesome and very exciting to have her endorsement."

However, the Bandits have also received some bad news, with this season's MVP Emma Mahady ruled out for the next fixture due to injury.

McDonald, who replaced outgoing championship coach Matt Paps, will now be looking to build upon the Bandits' roster before the NBL1 East season commences in March.

"We still have a lot of work to do, I have a lot of work to do," McDonald said.

"We have some other players who have moved on, they've got other opportunities, so we need to look at who we're going to get as imports, but also what we're going to do with the local youth players."

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