NBL Wrap Round 9: 2hard2guard Avant-garde

After losing Patty Mills, the Tigers were in a state of purgatory wondering how they were going to adjust to life without Patty. Cam Tragardh is currently leading the eague in points per game and he was going to have to continue to put the ball in the hoop for the Tigers to have any chance, and that he did with another 20pt outing and he had 7reb and 5ast to go with it, one thing can be said about Trigger, and that is he can deliver.

Lucas Walker showed some of that much talked about potential having a 20pt 8reb 4st explosion to match his wing team mate Ron Dorsey who also dropped 21pts and 6reb, which is almost more points in one game that he has scored all season, and we aren’t kidding, alright, maybe just a little bit.

Ayinde Ubaka will have to adjust back into the starting point guard role and didn’t do too badly with his 15pt output, but the Tigers didn’t get much else from anyone else except for the 14 rebounds from Tommy Greer.

But this game, exciting as it was with the trip into overtime was nothing more than the Thomas Abercrombie show, and boy did he put on a show, 6/9 from the 3pt line, dunking like he belongs in the air and just proving unstoppable to anyone in a Tigers uniform.

Darryl Corletto lit up his old team for 18pts, Cedric Jackson, while playing with some foul trouble was again a stat sheet filler with 10pts 6reb and 8ast and Mika Vukona did what Mika Vukona always does, grab rebounds and play defence while occasionally putting up some points, Vukona had another double double with 10pts 10reb and 5ast.

But it was Abercrombie who was the star of the night, his 33pts and 11reb drove his team to victory in overtime and in the absence of CJ Bruton and Kirk Penney from the Breakers squad, this could be the coming out party for the man many expect to one day be a solid Euroleague or NBA player, time will tell, but we should all marvel at the sights we are seeing from him now before they are gone.

(Box Score)

The Hawks are the holders of an unfortunate record in this year’s competition, and this game just continued the streak of 0 dunks for the year, and it’s not for a lack of trying.

Joevan Catron almost broke the hoodoo but Elvin “Rock Rims” Mimms denied him right at the moment of truth.

Catron is finding his feet ever so slowly and had a 15pt output in this game, why he doesn’t start in a Hawks team who desperately need a low post player is beyond comprehension, but we don’t coach the team so who are we to comment.

Helping Catron on the scoresheet was Oscar Forman with 13pts and 5reb but it was Tim Coenraad who dug deep to keep the Hawks in the game with his 22pts and the old veteran Glen Saville had 11reb but only 6pts, not much else was worth writing about for the Hawks except that they played tough defence to keep themselves in the game to the wire.

The Crocs welcomed back the big fella Luke Schenscher who they have been missing greatly, even though Schenscher only played 12 minutes, his presence was greatly felt by his team mates.

Elvin Mimms did his thing with an 18pt 9reb haul, Eddie Gill was proven to be human after all with a small output of only 9pts, but it was again another veteran in Peter “PC” Crawford who led the Crocs to victory.

PC had a game high 22pts and also had 7reb to go with it, he was inspirational in getting the Crocs over the line at the wire and in leading the comeback that the win came from. At least with the Crocs victory we don’t have to write something that rhymes like PC for 3 in OT, which we are sure you will all be happy about.

Regardless of ladder position a Perth v Adelaide game usually lives up to the hype. The two teams traditionally known for working together on the now extinct ‘Doomsday Double’ have always had a rivalry between each other and in recent years has swung the way of the underdone 36er unit.

This game was no exception. After a good start the Wildcats lets brain-fart after brain-fart subdue them. If the Cat’s weren’t throwing a wayward pass they were wrapping up 36ers on the fast break for the USF or being whistled for three seconds in the keyway. The Wildcats definitely missed the x-factor, something that Cam Tovey usually gives them. The Wildcats did however celebrate the return of champion point guard, Damian Martin back to the playing roster. Marto celebrated himself by totally annihilating a Darren Ng fast break layup in one of the hugest blocks the jungle fans had seen since the JC era.

Adelaide on the other hand came to play and knocked down big shot after big shot. Chris Warren is not short on confidence when pulling up with the long shot or taking it to the hole, the dude definitely has swagger. The little warrior finished with 20 points and six assists. Diamon Simpson bought the type of game that matches his physique. The big Simpmiester finished hith 22 points and hauled in 10 boards. Daniel Johnson found it hard banging away against Matty Knight and began looking outside the key to finish with 12 points to go with 10 boards.

This is the second time the 36ers have rolled the Wildcats on Perth’s home court. If memory serves me correct it happened last season too (We’re sure someone will tell us if this isn’t the case), but more importantly, the win lifts Adelaide from out of last place.

Drew Williamson’s season is at crossroads. Having no impact so far this season Drew saw less than two minutes of action in the second quarter and appears to be out of favour with the coaching staff. Matty Knight  finished with 21, Kevin Lisch 16 and Jesse Wagstaff found himself on the scorer’s list with 12.

The Kings gave their kingsfolk something to cheer about with a gutsy five point win over the gritty Cairns Taipans.

Whilst the Kings went to their faithful beasts inside the Taipans looked to settle this from outside. That tactic did not work for the Snakes. When compared to the Kings 34 points in the paint the Snakes paltry 18 paint points was never going to cut it, especially when they are shooting 6/26 from deep.

In fact when you compare the Snakes 33% from the field to the Kings 44% you really have to wonder how this game only had a margin on 5 points. Andrew Warren gave it is everything (as usual) to lead the team with 19 points, whilst Jamar Wilson finished with 10 points and 9 boards. Ian Crosswhite grabbed himself 10 boards but other than that there wasn’t anything offered from anyone else. Alex Loughton who was so good earlier in the round went missing, thanks largely to foul trouble and Jeff Dowdell didn’t let his 4 boards get in the way of this 1/7 from the field.

Julian Khazzouh and Jerai Grant were too classy for the Taipans front court. Khazzouh scored a team high 18 points whilst Grant ripped a huge dunk on his way to 10. Luke Martin put in a 10 point cameo. Sydney haven’t given their fans a lot to cheer about, especially at home where lacklustre performances are strongly being considered the norm; and of a team with fans that are unsettled with a lot of the teams make-up this win means a lot more than another notch in the win column.

There were a few stinkers this round, but after little thought it was an easy award to give this week.

The Taipan’s back-up back court tandem of Deba George and Kerry Williams get to share the trophy for at least a week. Combining for just shy of 15 minutes of action in Sunday’s game versus the Kings, George and Williams combined for six missed shots, a turnover and a bunch of doughnuts in every other category.

Thomas Abercrombie was flying high against the Tigers and flies even higher with the esteemed ‘gimme my change award’ this week.

Thomas lit up the Tigers for 33 points (at 56% from the floor & 6/9 from outside), 11 rebounds, 4 assists and even found time to swat 2 shots, playing a pivotal role in the Breakers double overtime win over the Melbourne Tigers.