The Takamatsu Five Arrows have quietly crept into the conversation about the teams with the best chance to shake things up in the Western Conference playoff hunt.
Though they are in sixth place in the seven-team conference, the Five Arrows have made rapid progress since veteran coach John Neumann's club added foreign players to the roster following an 0-5 start (0-4 without any imports) and an offseason tarnished by uncertainty over the team's future.
As you may recall, there was even talk the team might skip the season due to a lack of finances and re-enter the league for the 2010-11 campaign. That, of course, was a major setback for the team as it sought to build a quality roster for the start of the season.